Crimson
by NamelessHeretic
Summary: Currently in developement hell. Dead but twitching every now and then.
1. Bloody Birthday

AN: Hello, all. Yep, I'm at it again, writing two fics at once! Now, while this does hamper my ability to update fics quickly, I think I've earned a bit of leeway in that I have actually _finished_ most of my fics. That seems to be quite a feat on this site, from what I've seen. In other news, I've beaten Gears of War (Sweet game, definitely going to keep an eye out for the sequel). Before you ask, I don't have writers block for The Red Flash, as I've actually outlined the whole thing (sort of…)… I just lack the urge to write it. And when that happens, my writing turns shitty, so I'm just putting this up to write until I get the urge to go back to The Red Flash.

One thing unique about this fic is that I'm going in a new direction (for me, at least) with it. While I'm still writing it, I'm actually doing a proper outline for it. Shocking, I know. It proved to be very irritating at first, making a proper outline on Microsoft Word, but I've got the hang of it now.

Well, I won't keep you any longer. Enjoy the fic!

_A Nameless Heretic Production:_

_**Crimson**_

**_Chapter one: Bloody Birthday_**

The large, round room was dark as no true source of light was within it, save for a series of small, miniscule candles. In the center was a round table, at which sat a series of mysterious figures in silver cloaks. They were silent, each giving absolute and undivided attention to the man at the 'head' of the table, whom was wearing a golden cloak.

While at first glance this figure was of modest height, the cloaked being exuded a presence of power and control, the likes of which most witches and wizards had never seen, even when in the presence of Albus Dumbledore, who was considered the greatest wizard of the age by most, and a senile old fool by others.

The figure in golden robes spoke, and his masculine voice proved to identify him as a man.

"In a matter of hours, our efforts will be realized, and the second phase of our plan will come into effect," he said in an ancient, but very strong, voice. "More than half a century ago, we had molded our first puppet into a being of hate and bigotry. He now holds the magical world in fear… but soon our second pawn will become apparent, striking down the first and be placed on the road to becoming our unwittingly faithful servant… The Tides of Fate are strong tonight indeed."

(…Divider-Thingy…)

It was just another day in the Potter household, magical home of (of course) the Potter family. Consisting of James Potter, the father, Lily Potter nee Evans, the mother, Harry Potter, the son, Cassandra Potter, the daughter, and the as-of-yet unidentified fetus within Lily Potter's womb, they proved to be a happy family of wand wavers indeed.

Wait; back up… it was not a normal day.

After all, young wizards with black hair and green eyes don't turn five every day, now do they?

"Harry, wake up!" shouted a minutely pregnant Lily Potter as she looked up the stairs, summoning her lethargic son from his room. "Breakfast is ready! And you wouldn't want to waste your big day in bed, would you?"

Immediately, she was met with a "Coming, mum!" from above her, as well as the faint pitter-patter of young feet as her son's feet pounded on the floor while he scurried from his room. Her green eyes lit up in amusement as they met identical eyes, hidden behind a wild mess of jet black hair, accompanied by a very familiar crooked grin. "Can I open presents now?" asked Harry.

Lily shook her head. "No, baby, you'll have to wait until after the party, which won't be until noon. Now come on, your pancakes are get-," she was cut off a blurry figure darting down the stares and into the breakfast nook. She smirked and blew a few stray strands of hair out of her face. "Like clockwork."

Looking out the window, she frowned at the dark clouds that came there way. The twenty five year old red-head hoped that it wouldn't rain, as they were setting up the party outside in the front yard of the Godric's Hallow. She waved off such thoughts for now, knowing that a few waves of her wand would set up a perfectly functional canopy if there was any drizzle, and that they could always just move the party within the house.

She turned towards the table, smiling as her son practically inhaled the pancakes she had cooked, mirroring his father's actions as the older man did the same while reading the paper.

"Mum?" asked a soft voice. Lily looked down to her right, seeing her daughter tugging at her robes. "Why are boys so gross?"

"We are not gross! Girls are the ones who are icky!" protested Harry, somehow managing to stay coherent through a mouthful of pancakes.

"Harry, don't talk with your mouth full," said Lily.

"Sorry…" Harry swallowed his pancakes. "Aren't I right, dad?"

"Yes, Harry, you are absolutely right," said James. "Girls have cooties."

"Then why did you marry mum?" asked Cassandra.

"Mum's not a girl, dummy," said Harry, sticking his tongue out. He was met with his sister's tongue in a similar fashion, and thus the tongue-spitting-sound fight ensued. Lily merely rolled her eyes and sat down next to her husband, who was chuckling to his children's antics.

"You just _had_ to encourage him, didn't you?" she asked her husband scathingly.

"Yep."

"You have absolutely no remorse for making your children do this?" she asked, pointing at the two children as they started making faces at each other. James took off his glasses, cleaned them, and put them back on. He then observed his quarreling children for a moment. "…well?" asked Lily. He looked at her with a solemn expression.

"None."

"You're hopeless."

James just gave a hearty laugh and went back to reading the Daily Prophet while Lily sipped her coffee. The children had calmed down now, and were now eating their breakfasts in relative peace. The mother's thoughts began to drift once again, and had moved onto much more grave topics than before… namely, the current war with the self proclaimed Dark Lord Voldemort. Just thinking about it made her shiver, although she did her best to hide it.

Now, do not misunderstand. Lily Potter was a fierce and courageous witch, and held no fear of Voldemort. However, she worried for her family, and what the ravages of war would do to it. Her worst nightmares were filled with images of her children in pain, and her husband dead and glassy eyed at her feet. She suppressed a shudder, and continued to drink her morning coffee.

She really had little to worry about. She and her family were hidden under the Fidilius Charm, a powerful security ward that allowed them to live in their home without anyone realizing it, even if they were standing right at their doorway. However, in order for this wonderful spell to work, they needed a secret keeper, the one person who could reveal to others where their house was. They had, at first, chosen Sirius Black as he was James's best friend. However, after thinking it over, they decided that he was much too obvious and that Peter would be a less obvious choice. Sirius would act as the perfect decoy.

She and James were confident that Peter would keep their secret safe. He was a timid, quiet man who kept to himself, so there was little chance that he would get drunk and start spilling his guts to someone unsavory. In addition to that, he was one of James's best friends, he was a Marauder! The rat animagus would not, could not betray them.

"Hey mum…?" asked Harry shyly. Lily looked up and tilted her head in curiosity, her former train of thought gone for now.

"Yes, honey?"

"Umm… since it's my birthday and all, do you think I could try doing magic with your wand? Or maybe dad's?" Harry then gave her the patented, 'uber-cute-five-year-old-look-that-you-cannot-resist.' Lily sighed, and made it quite evident that said look was not nearly as reliable as people thought.

"I'm sorry honey, maybe next year," she said, smiling apologetically. "If you're a good boy, that is." Harry just gave a dispassionate shrug, and muttered an 'okay.'

Several hours later, thirteen minutes past noon to be exact, the guests began to arrive. The first was Harry's godfather and James's best friend, Sirius Orion Black, the 'White Sheep' of the illustrious Black Family. In his hands was a long, straight box wrapped up in ever-color-changing wrapping paper. He gave James a manly hug and Lily a similar, but more careful hug after stepping out of the floo.

Blowing soot out of his bangs, he gave the Potter children his trademark roguish grin. "Hey there you two, you excited about today?" he asked. The children nodded enthusiastically and cheered and after wishing Harry a Happy Birthday Sirius picked them up and twirled them around over his shoulders while Lily put the present away on the table, along with Harry's other gifts.

Next to come from the fireplace was Cassandra's Godfather, Remus Lupin. Despite his age of twenty six, he appeared to be entering his mid forties due to his lupine condition. This had also made it difficult to make him Cassandra's godfather; however James and Lily had managed it after fighting tooth and nail with the ministry, claiming that Remus was perfectly capable of handling the responsibility.

Within the werewolf's hands were three wrapped parcels, no doubt books due to Remus's studious nature. After handing the gifts to Lily, Remus gave a cheery laugh as the children squealed in excitement at seeing their 'Furry Uncle Moony.' While Sirius began chatting and catching up with James, Remus was pulling quarters from behind his goddaughter's ear. It was amazing how children could be so amused by the muggle world's imitation of magic, but Remus himself also couldn't help but like their methods. "Happy Birthday, kiddo."

"Is Peter coming?" asked Lily, wondering where the future godfather of her next child was.

"He said he needed to take care of a few things, but would be here before one," said Remus. "He's been going out a lot lately… I wonder what he's been up to."

"I still think he's got a girlfriend that he's not telling us about," said Lily, who sweat dropped at the bout of laughter from her husband and his friends. "Honestly, Peter can have a girlfriend if he wants to!"

"Well, Peter is a nice guy, Lils, but… he's _Peter_," said James, fighting down a laugh. "He'd be too shy to ask a girl out."

"Oh, really?" asked a new voice, accompanied by a flash of flames. The Potters, Black, and Lupin all looked down into the fireplace, and were met with a grinning Peter Pettigrew. "I never thought I'd be such a topic for a lover's quarrel."

"Oh, come on in Peter!" laughed Sirius, clearing the way for the mousy man to come in. The man stepped out of the emerald green flames, dusting himself off. "So, how's our favorite rat? You keep slinking away from us; we're starting to wonder if you have _new _friends!"

"Heaven forbid, Sirius," said Peter, grinning. Tucked under his arm was another present, large and box shaped. "Happy Birthday, Harry!"

"Thanks, Uncle Peter," said the boy, smiling.

With all the guests there for Harry's big day, the Potters and Marauders moved out into the front yard, where a large table was set up for them to eat. Lily would've loved to have more people over, but with them going into hiding and such, it was difficult to know who was trustworthy, and even more difficult to _find_ those who they knew were trustworthy.

She shook her head, and put on her best smile as they all sat down to eat the lunch she had prepared. The men ate ravenously, even the timid Peter, while Lily and Cassandra ate at a more graceful, dignified pace. She knew why the men were all eating so quickly: They wanted to get to the presents as soon as possible. She sighed. Even though her husband had grown up a lot by his seventh year at Hogwarts, he was still a kid at heart.

'Part of his charm, of course,' she noted mentally.

Her meal, which had taken two hours to make, was consumed in less than fifteen minutes. She grinned as her son moved on to the cake, which was a work of art if she did say so herself.

"Make a wish, Harry!" she said. Harry thought for a moment, and took in a deep breath.

It had happened so fast…

The first thing Lily heard that told her something was wrong was a popping sound. Not of apparition, this was impossible due to the wards of course, but the popping sound of Peter's gift bursting open with a jet of sickly purple light shooting into the sky. There was a cry of pain as Lily partially saw Sirius fall to the ground, a pool of blood soaking his robes.

Before she could even conceive a thought on what was happening, she had grabbed Harry and Cassandra and made a break for the house while her husband and his friends tried to fight off the intruders. She chanced a look over her shoulder, and saw men and women in black robes were coming out of Peter's gift. Lily's eyes widened in horror as she saw her husband fall to the ground, crying out in pain as his arm was torn apart by a jet of dark magic. The caster was none other than Peter Pettigrew, who now stood among the Death Eaters, Voldemort's servants, with his wand raised.

"Traitor!" cried Sirius from the ground. He pulled out his own wand, and erected a shield between himself, his fallen friend, and the group of dark wizards before them.

Remus roared in outrage from behind the picnic table, and fired off a volley of stunning spells. A part of him wished that it was a full moon, and not the middle of the day. He ducked below a killing curse, and retaliated by casting some of the nastier spells he knew, such as a bone-twisting-hex, and a satisfied smirk formed on his face as a Death Eater cried out when his forearm tore open, the bones warping and tearing through his flesh.

Sirius continued to erect his most powerful magical shield while James re-oriented himself. After getting a firm grasp of his wand, he grimaced and transfigured some nearby rocks into a series of golems, which he animated and ordered to fight off the Dark Lord's servants.

Meanwhile, Lily had hidden the children in the broom-shed (she would never question James's judgment in the matters of Quidditch again) and pulled out her own wand. She levitated a bird-bath and banished it at the Death Eaters, who sent curses at it and the golems, causing the stone structure to explode in a cloud of dust. She summoned anther bird bath on the other side of the Death Eaters, and scored a hit on one of them. He fell to the ground, grasping his head in pain as blood soaked his hair and hood.

Her emerald eyes, now blazing in fury, looked for the treacherous rat, Peter Pettigrew. He was not there. She sneered, knowing that the treacherous bastard was no doubt fleeing while in his animagus form.

Little did she know, a very familiar rodent was trying to sneak past her.

However, her maternal instincts flared as the rat neared her children who were hiding away in the broom shed, and she coldly sent a reducto into the rats flesh, killing him instantly. However, she spat in anger as the 'rat' warped for a moment, before turning into a crumbled mound of rocks. She froze as she felt a new sensation… she suddenly felt very exposed.

The wards had fallen. Pe-, no, _Pettigrew_, must have deactivated the anchoring runes for the wards. There was a staccato of pops as more Death Eaters apparated in. She glanced at her husband and the two other Marauders, who seemed to be holding her own.

"LILY!" shouted James. "TAKE THE KIDS AND RUN!"

She nodded, and quickly opened the broom shed and took the children into her arms.

"Mum, what's going on? Who are those bad people?" asked Cassandra, tears in her eyes.

"Shh, it'll be alright. But we need to run." Lily slung the both of them over her shoulders and ran for the house, which had emergency portkeys for the Potters. However, upon entering the house the woman was faced with three Death Eaters, one of which she recognized as Bellatrix Lestrange.

"Oh, well if it isn't _perfect Lily Potter_," she spat. A grin formed on her aristocratic face, a grin of the most frightening variety. "I want to hear you and your filthy little half-breed children scream…"

Lily snarled in anger at the thought of her children being tortured and dashed towards the kitchen. She hid them both under the counter, and put up her strongest stationary shield ward, before turning to face her three adversaries. She and Bellatrix stared each other down, while the Lestrange waved the other two Death Eaters away.

"I alone will have the pleasure of killing you," she said maliciously, licking her lips. "And then, as you bleed to death on the ground, I'll tear apart your ickle kiddies."

Lily's eyes narrowed, and her magic began gathering at the tip of her wand for a powerful curse she was about to use. "I will _end_ you," she hissed. This woman had threatened her children… her whole world. Lily Potter would show no mercy to Bellatrix Lestrange.

"Shall we begin then, Lily-Flower?" asked Bellatrix, fingering her wand ecstatically. She was answered with a large purple beam of light, which she side-stepped. "I'll take that as a yes! Crucio!" Bellatrix's wand emitted a ragged red beam of light that struck Lily in the chest.

The woman fell to the ground, biting back the urge to scream in agony. Using the pain and anger to further fuel her resolve, Lily shot off a bone-breaking hex and a reductor curse, which was blocked by a magical shield. Lily shook off the after affects of the curse and conjured a cloud of smoke-screen, slipping away from her position as a killing curse caused her favorite vase to explode.

'I'll make it _slow_ for that, Lestrange,' thought Lily.

Sneaking up behind her opponent, Lily fired a close-range blasting curse, which tore apart its target with a brutal pulse of magical energy. However, her target proved to be an elaborate decoy. Bellatrix's robes were torn apart by the curse, revealing a hastily transfigured manikin underneath.

A feminine cackle filled the room, and Lily gripped her wand tighter, beginning a very complicated set of wand movements. With a small gust of wind brought on by some minor wandless magic **(1)**, Lily cleared away her smoke screen.

Bellatrix stood before her, sticking her long fingernails into the magical shield that Lily had erected. Static electricity arced around the woman's slender hand as she attempted to disrupt the spell with her hand.

"BACK OFF FROM MY KIDS, BITCH!" shouted Lily, releasing the spell she had been casting. Several jets of blue fire came from her wand, arcing around her and seeking her target. Bellatrix dashed away from two jets of fire, which impacted where she had been standing moments before. However, her robes had been singed, and the woman screamed in pain as more fire hit her just before she erected a shield.

Bellatrix's body was still on the ground, bits of flame still burning brightly. Lily raised her wand to take care of her for good, when her back suddenly exploded in pain. She grimaced, feeling blood soak her clothing. Turning around, she ducked below a killing curse which impacted on her shield, overloading it and leaving her children exposed.

She had to act fast.

Lily snarled in outrage and charged at the two Death Eaters, enveloping herself in a rotating shield. A white dome of light began spinning in front of her, whining loudly as it tore through the air while she charged. The Death Eaters shot off spells, which were either deflected or absorbed by the shield.

With a shrill battle cry, Lily slammed into the two Death Eaters her shield continuing to rotate at dangerous speeds, the magic ripping their flesh and robes apart. They cried out in pain, and blood sprayed all over the walls and ceiling. Lily canceled the spell, panting as she fell to her knees in a sea of blood.

She caught her breath and forced herself to her feet, and looked over to the kitchen. Harry and Cassandra were huddled in a corner, crying. Lily walked over to them, and kneeled next to them.

"Are you alright?" she asked, caressing their cheeks. They sniffled, and then threw themselves into her arms. "Sssshhh, it'll be alright," she cooed. Lily looked up and saw through the window. Blinking away tears, Lily saw that her husband now laid on the ground still, his wand held loosely in his hand. Sirius and Remus were now fighting off Death Eaters back to back, casting shields and curses with reckless abandon. Sirius was scowling and shouting his incantations in such a rage that they were nearly incoherent, while Remus had a positively feral look on his face, pure destructive magic firing from his wand and ripping the death eaters apart.

"I'm sorry, Lily."

Lily froze. She knew that voice… that simpering, timid, damnable voice. She turned her head, looking towards the man who had ruined her life. Peter Pettigrew stood in the kitchen doorway, his wand held in her direction. "He was going to kill me," he pleaded.

"You're a coward, Pettigrew. You're lower than a rat," she roared, like a tiger pouncing on its prey. Her fury and anger were blinding her now, and the usually calm and collected Lily Potter became a ravenous nexus of righteous fury. "Now you die!"

In her anger, all was forgotten except for one thing: Pettigrew must die.

However, as she lunged towards the rat animagus, she found herself feeling a sudden sense of vertigo. She felt light headed, and felt a dull pain as Pettigrew shot a jet of light at her shoulder. She suddenly felt very cold…

She tried to move, she really did, but she lay helpless on the tile floor as her husband's former comrade fired a killing curse at her daughter. Tears fell to the ground as the jet of green light hit Cassandra's chest, her expression in one of shock as her 'Uncle Pete' ended her life so young. Harry continued to stare in shock, his eyes dull and tears streaming down his face.

Cassandra fell, her auburn hair covering her face as she hit the ground, lifeless.

Lily Potter felt something snap.

The pain bled away, leaving only a cold anger. She stood, unhindered, her wand in hand and all of her magic flowing into it. Without a thought, she sent a curse at the rat before he could move onto her son. He cried out in pain as the curse literally tore him apart, covering the entire kitchen in his filthy, treacherous blood.

Lily waved her wand, and saw her son be levitated into a cupboard door.

"Stay there," she said in a voice that was not her own. Harry only nodded.

The witch jumped through the window, which was now shattered, and found herself staring at a group of about a dozen Death Eaters. Remus and Sirius lay on the ground, dead, but their faces still contorted in terrifying expressions of rage.

"Well looky here… she isn't too bad lookin' for a mudblood," cackled a nearby Death Eater, his eyes raking over her bloody form. Lily turned to him, her face neutral. "Wanna have some fun-" He was interrupted as a sword was conjured and banished at him, impaling him through the groin. With a flick of her wand, Lily's conjured blade exploded, sending bits and pieces of the Death Eater all over his comrades.

"KILL HER!" they shouted as one.

Lily side-stepped a killing curse, and batted away an incoming bone-breaking curse. Numerous cutting curses tore through her body, but she ignored it. It was superficial pain. It was nothing compared to what had happened to her husband, her daughter, or her friends. It did not even come close to that, or the psychological trauma that had now befallen her only son.

She could take the pain.

Without saying a word, Lily conjured a violet jet of flame, which formed into a whip at the tip of her wand. She swung it around, burning through three Death Eaters and sending them out of commission. Another killing curse whizzed past her head, and with a flick of her wand the Death Eater was sent flying into a nearby tree, his skull exploding in a fountain of blood as it slammed into the trunk.

Lily dashed towards another, her wand at her side and becoming engulfed in a red light. She slashed through the Death Eater, noting that her left arm had been blown off by a curse. After killing the Death Eater, who now lay dead in his own intestines, she cauterized her wound with a conjured flame.

It was okay, she was right handed anyway.

"What in the hell is she?" shouted another Death Eater from behind her.

"She's a bloody monster!"

"A DEMON!"

Lily ignored them, and her emerald eyes rose. It was raining now, like a thousand angels crying from the heavens. Lightning flashed, a mile away, illuminating the area.

A silver curse pierced through her back, coming out the other side of her torso. There was a popping sound as she apparated away, and the Death Eaters screamed as she reappeared behind them.

She jabbed her wand at them, sending a bolt of red lightning at the nearest Death Eater. He hastily raised a shield, causing the spell to be deflected. However, the magic merely arced towards another Death Eater, frying his nervous system and sending him to the ground in a smoking heap.

Only one Death Eater remained now.

"P-p-please! Have mercy!" he shouted, falling to his knees and hiding beneath his hands. His wand lay next to him, forgotten. Lily smelled the distinct scent of urine emanating from the man. Her face, which had for the past while been frozen in an iron mask of nothingness, contorted into a sneer.

"No."

Her wand twitched.

The man screeched as his skin erupted in thousands of boils, which burst open and caused as acidic puss to cover his entire body. Her writhed on the ground, screaming, begging for it to stop. Lily sent cutting curses at his spinal cord, leaving him completely paralyzed.

She walked over to his still body, kneeling down next to him. Her red bangs, now red with blood instead of her beautiful auburn, covered her eyes, making her appearance all the more sinister. She whispered, "Does it hurt? Do you want it to stop?"

"Yes…" wheezed the man, sobbing. "Please…"

Lily shook her head, an evil smirk marring her beautiful face. "_Sectumsempra_," she hissed, waving her wand all across his body. Blood soaked his black robes, and a puddle of the crimson liquid formed on the ground. "Bleed, Death Eater, bleed and die."

He continued to plead for mercy, but she did not listen. She stalked towards the house, and noted that she had attained a leg injury sometime during her brutal slaughter of the remaining Death Eaters. She began to feel even colder…

"Harry…" she whispered, her words barely heard over the howling wind. She entered the kitchen, and with a wave of her wand the cupboard opened again, and she levitated her son back into her arms. "Harry…" she said again.

"Mum… why?" cried Harry. Lily gave a ragged cough, and leaned against the wall. She slid down, her blood leaving a large crimson streak.

"Bad people…" said Lily. She grasped Harry's hand, placing her wand into his tiny fingers. "Remember Harry… swish and flick."

She guided him through the motion. Harry repeated the motion.

"Now, say 'Wingardium Leviosa,'" said Lily.

"_Wingardium Leviosa_," said Harry, sniffling. A spoon rose from the kitchen sink, wobbled for a moment, and then fell back into it with a clang. "Mum…?"

"H-Harry… grow strong, Harry… and live."

Outside, a lone candle stayed lit.

"Mum? …mum?

"MUM?"

There was a gust of wind, and the flame was extinguished. The cake, presents, and decorations lay forgotten in the blood and rain.


	2. Fate be a Fickle Friend

AN: To elaborate on that '**(1)**' last chapter, I meant to put an explanation in an authors note, but I forgot…. Heh, sorry! Anyway, concerning wandless magic… Given what we have seen in the movies (and the books… don't remember), wandless magic is NOT impossible. I think that using it for relatively simple things, like moving things, gusts of wind, or a simple pulse of energy, is possible.

Anyway, moving on, here's chapter two!

_A Nameless Heretic Production:_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Two: Fate be a Fickle Friend**_

"Oh dear…"

That was all Albus Dumbledore could say after reading an urgent owl message. Evidently, Neville Longbottom, round and good-natured five year old, had become the Vanquisher-of-He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and was now hailed as the Boy-Who-Lived. Unfortunately, Frank and Alice Longbottom were killed in the attack, leaving the boy orphaned.

"What to do, what to do…" the old wizard began to ponder on what had to be done with the boy, for now the wheels of fate were in motion, and Neville Longbottom would prove to be the most important part. The prophecy was now engaged.

Dumbledore knew his duty…

He stood from his desk, walked over to the pot next to his fireplace, and tossed a handful of floo powder into the flames. The orange tongues turned an emerald green, and Dumbledore shouted, "THE HOUSE OF FRANK AND ALICE LONGBOTTOM!"

The flames enveloped him, sending him careening through the mysterious subspace that wizards had managed to harness for their own uses not too long ago, and he quickly found himself standing the fireplace of a much damaged living room.

His blue eyes, which at normal times twinkled, were sad and slightly watery as he looked at the once neat and tidy living room, which was now covered in ash and broken furniture. The family portrait, which once hung above the fireplace with the happy, waving figures of the Longbottom family, was now torn in half and on the ground, a flame still consuming Alice's now crying face. Dumbledore frowned, and with a flick of his wand the flame ceased.

"…that, do you think the boy will recover?" he heard from the hallway. The headmaster walked briskly towards the source of the voice, and quickly found the aurors who had been called onto the scene. At his feet, surrounded by a white line of chalk, was the body of Frank Longbottom. His face was frozen in an expression of fear, but his body was left unmarked.

"Definitely the killing curse… alright, bag 'em. We need to take care of the mother now," said a familiar voice. Dumbledore's eyes fell upon a roughly sixty year old man, his face marred with dozens of scars and a large chunk of his nose missing. One of his eyes, a shocking electric blue, swiveled around in a disturbing manner. "Aye, Albus, I see you got the letter."

"Indeed, Alastor," said Dumbledore solemnly. His eyes settled on Franks face as the aurors covered him in a black body bag, tagging the zipper with his name. "What of the boy?"

"He's hiding under his bed upstairs," answered the auror. "Scared stiff, and I don't blame him… won't let go of his mother's hand either."

"I see… may I see him?"

"Be my guest; just tell the aurors upstairs that I sent ya."

Dumbledore nodded in thanks, and quickly ascended the staircase. He passed several more portraits, each portraying the likenesses of other members of the Longbottom family. Most were either crying our brooding, some missing from their frames. As Dumbledore reached the top, he made his way to the room at the end of the hall.

"Alastor sent me," said Dumbledore to the auror at the door. He nodded and stepped aside, allowing the older man through. The old Mugwump stifled a gasp as he entered the room.

Neville Longbottom was currently beneath his bed, only his hand out, grasping the cold dead fingers of his mother. There were several spots of blood on the floor, some on the prone Alice's robes as she stared blankly at the ceiling. Dumbledore carefully walked towards the bed, kneeling down so that he could discern the boy beneath his bed.

Neville shied away from the sudden movement, sensing an intruder in his range of site. Above his right eye was a jagged, lightning bolt shaped scar. The boy sniffed, blinking away tears. "Why won't mum wake up?" he whispered.

Albus shook his head sadly. "I'm sorry, my boy, but your mother is gone… she won't wake." Neville burst into tears, gripping his mother's hand tighter. He begged Dumbledore to tell him it was a lie, to make it all not true.

Oh, what Dumbledore wouldn't give for that kind of power…

"Please," cried the boy. "Make it go away… you're Dumbledore, you can do anything! My mum always says so."

Dumbledore bowed his head, and grasped the boy's hand. "I'm sorry."

The boy kept crying, begging someone to make it better…

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Dumbledore closed the door to the newly made room in his home, in which the Boy Who Lived now slept fitfully. He had been forced to slip the boy a dreamless sleep potion to calm him down enough to move him here. His grandmother had demanded for Dumbledore to leave Neville with her, but he knew his duty.

Neville was now the center of the prophecy… he couldn't allow the scenario to be interfered with, and he could only trust himself with such a key element in the prophecy. He would be trained to defeat Voldemort, as his destiny dictated, and then he would act as the sovereign over all of Great Britain… and if things went according to plan, all of Europe.

Dumbledore could not trust the current Longbottom Matriarch with such a tender, important piece to the plan. He would train the boy himself, guiding him through both the ways of the wand and the ways of politics. He sat down in his study, a flash of orange flames appearing next to him. Fawkes landed on the head of the chair's backrest, an envelope in his beak.

"They know then?" Dumbledore was answered with a trill. "Of course, they probably already knew I'd do it." With a sigh, the old man took the letter and opened it.

_Dumbledore,_

_You have done well. The boy would not have become what we needed if he were to be raised by his grandmother. However, know this: If your guidance of him is not up to par, we will find a replacement._

There was no signature, and the letter burst into flames in Dumbledore's hands. He took a piece of parchment and put it on his desk, dipping a quill into the inkwell.

"I suppose we should get started."

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

And so, the war with Voldemort had come to an end, and the wizarding world entered an era of reasonably peaceful times. The last of the Death Eaters (at least those recognized as such by the Ministry) were captured and put into Azkaban or executed, depending on the severity of their crimes.

The current Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, began to enjoy a peaceful and relatively simple reign as the Magical Leader of Britain. With the Dark Lord gone, he no longer had to pretend that everything was fine. In addition to that, he mysteriously received mounds and mounds of galleons from anonymous donators. Coincidentally, he also now had tea and crumpets with his good friends Lucius Malfoy, Crabbe Sr., and Goyle Sr. on Sundays.

However, the Magical World was not without its losses and difficulties. The ties between man and goblin became more strained, although the two races seemed to follow a pattern; Alliance, Rebellion, War, Defeat, and Alliance again. The economy had also dropped somewhat, due to families no longer throwing all of their money into sneakoscopes and other such 'Dark Detectors,' much of which didn't even work at all. This economic plunder was also partially why the strain of the goblin-man relationship was becoming even more intense.

However, as all things do, life went on.

A new generation of wizards and witches attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, gaining finesse and control over their powers, skill in the arts of the cauldron, and knowledge of the past, as well as education of the Muggle World which they concealed themselves from. Dumbledore remained as Headmaster, although he had to split his time between Hogwarts and his 'Grandson,' the Boy Who Lived.

Indeed, Neville Longbottom grew into a strong, if somewhat overconfident and arrogant young man. He also proved to be completely loyal to Dumbledore, as well as any cause of the Light. He developed all of the Griffindor qualities; Boldness, bravery, chivalry, charity… as well as becoming judgmental, reckless, narrow minded, and self-righteous. Nonetheless, he grew into the archetypical champion of the Wizarding World.

Despite his youth, he could easily take on even the smartest third year at the age of nine, for Dumbledore had molded him into a very skilled duelist and wizard. He excelled at Defense against the Dark Arts, as well as other subjects. However, his prowess in Potions was practically nonexistent, a fact which one Severus Snape, the Hogwarts Potions Professor and Master, loved to torment the boy on. 

Meanwhile, the children who had been orphaned by the war went in and out of orphanages and foster homes, although some were lucky enough to be sent to their loving relatives… although, not nearly as many as anyone would've liked were that lucky. One prime example was Harry James Potter, now the only member of the Potter Family, and one of the lone survivors of what came to be known as the Potter Family Massacre.

The details on the event were very sketchy, but from what the aurors observed, they were able to infer that it was all one big bloody mess.

Literally.

Bodies littered the entire area, and as the secret keeper (later identified as Peter Pettigrew) was dead, the Fidilius Charm had ceased to function and allowed the aurors to investigate. Some of them were barely recognizable.

The only of the Death Eaters to have survived the event was Bellatrix Lestrange, whom would've been sent straight to Azkaban if she were not in a coma. The aurors had found her breathing shallowly in the kitchen, the left side of her face and patches of her body burnt beyond anything the doctors could help (not that they wanted to anyway) and seeming out of place on her aristocratic beauty.

Normally she would've been executed, but she was far too close to the Dark Lord. The knowledge she had was no doubt priceless, and she would be taken care of until she awoke and was of use to the Ministry.

As for the other survivor, Harry Potter… well, Kingsley Shacklebolt would never forget that day.

The auror team had been deployed immediately after the last of the wards fell, and Shacklebolt had to force down a wave of bile at the sight of the bodies. They littered the area, dried blood encrusting their robes and wounds. The worst was a Death Eater who had been cut all over his body, the wounds going deep into his body. He had obviously died of blood loss, and Shacklebolt felt a small stab of pity for the man, despite his choice of position in the war.

All of the wands had been collected upon arrival, so that they could be processed and returned to the families of their owners. Shacklebolt had been the one to find the bodies of Lily Potter, Cassandra Potter, and what he thought was Peter Pettigrew. The boy, Harry, lay in his mother's lap, nearly catatonic. The boy didn't respond to Shacklebolt's questions, and they were forced to levitate him out of the room. His mother's wand was still in hand, trapped in a death grip.

The aurors had attempted to take it from him, and the boy had finally responded to them, seeming to finally recognize their presence.

A lot of yelling, screaming, and about two dozen broken fingers later, they had finally gotten the wand back from the boy, who they were forced to stun in order to keep him from harming anyone else, including himself. What was truly frightening was that only one stunner didn't work. The entire squad of aurors had to stun him multiple times to put him down for good… Shacklebolt hoped that the boy would be alright. He too had been forced to watch his family die as a child, but he was a lot older, his sister had survived, it wasn't due to betrayal of a trusted family friend, and it wasn't on his birthday.

In the end, Shacklebolt knew that very few people could possibly understand how the young man was feeling… assuming the boy's very heart hadn't shut down.

Due to the chaotic aftermath of Voldemort's defeat, they were forced to simply drop the boy off at his relatives' house, the Dursleys. The woman (Petunia, Shacklebolt thought her name was) was absolutely terrified it seemed when they appeared at her door. She took Harry in without a word, and quickly demanded that the aurors get off of her property.

And so, children found new homes (whether they liked them or not), and life went on…

AN: Well, that's chapter two…

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Ya, I'm just gonna give you chapter three right after this. : ) I know, you love me.


	3. The Lonely One

_A Nameless Heretic Production:_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Three: The Lonely One**_

Harry James Potter was a very strange child indeed.

He easily stood out among his prim-and-proper classmates, who had been groomed and conditioned for years now to grow into 'upstanding members of society.' With his wild black hair, which never stayed in the same pattern of disarray two days in a row, he easily contrasted with the clean-cut and combed children of Little Winging. Another one of his defining features was his startling green eyes, which seemed to be forever gazing into another realm that none but Harry could see.

Indeed, while the boy did seem rather… slow… at first glance, he proved to be one of the most intelligent of his class. He rarely spoke, and when he did it was usually in a distracted manner. He had been taken in to be tested for drugs several times, but they always came out negative. He had even taken an IQ test to see if he was just plain stupid.

The woman who had looked over his test had fainted, and the only thing that she told Harry's teachers was to keep him in school, for there was nothing to worry about.

And so, the mysterious five year old grew up breezing through school, acing nearly everything they through at him. However, if he lacked interest in a subject (History, for example) he'd completely bomb it. Teachers often caught him sleeping in class…

"Mr. Potter?" asked Ms. Karen, standing next to the black-haired youth's desk as he slumbered, tapping her foot. She sighed, and gave him a light smack on the head with her ruler. He woke, looking around in a confused manner. "Ah, so you've decided to join us. Tell me, Mr. Potter, what is the simplified form of 9 thirty sixths??"

Harry gave her a blank look, and blinked. "One fourth."

"What is it in decimal form?"

"Zero point twenty-five."

"What would be the denominator of an equal fraction with the numerator of three hundred and ninety two?"

"One thousand five hundred sixty eight."

Ms. Karen sighed resignedly. "You got it right this time, Mr. Potter, but be careful… one day you'll be in class and wishing you had paid attention."

"Yes ma'am," said Harry. Ms. Karen returned to the board, and continued with the lesson. "…what was I supposed to be careful about again?"

Such was life in the world of Harry James Potter, the oddball of Little Winging, Surrey. However, his passive, seemingly idiotic genius was not the only thing that made him especially unique. While the other children immediately began forming their own cliques and circles of friends, the Potter child was alone. He made no effort to make friends, preferring to read books (which Ms. Karen was never able to identify, as they were always covered buy brown paper) and sit by himself by the swings.

One day, the boy received a visit…

It had not been more than three months since Harry Potter was dropped off at the doorstep of his relatives, the Dursleys. After the aurors had left, Vernon had first thrown a fit and 'explained the rules' to the boy. He was to do his chores as they gave them, stay quiet, not ask questions, and sleep in the cupboard.

At the mention of the word 'cupboard,' the boy had twitched, and Vernon saw the coldest, cruelest green eyes ever to discern this world… but only for a second. The boy's face returned to its passive, far away look, and he simply refused to sleep in the cupboard, and calmly demanded more reasonable terms for his being there.

He came up with the following: Harry demanded access to his mother's old schoolbooks, he got his own bedroom (he only cared if it had a bed, dresser, a source of light, and a bookshelf), and that the Dursleys left him the hell alone. In return, he would cook breakfast and clean the house, and he would leave the Dursleys alone, making himself scarce should any guests come over.

At first, Vernon had been infuriated to have a 'freak, demon-spawned' child talk back to him, and made it well known by bringing his fist back. 'The look,' as Vernon would later call it, retuned to Harry's face and the large man found himself on his back, tasting blood. At that point, Petunia spoke for Vernon and agreed.

The boy had kept his word, and proved to be unusually skilled in the culinary arts (when Petunia asked him where he learned to cook, he had snapped the stirring-spoon in his hand, and a gust of wind had nearly knocked Petunia off of her feet). The house was also kept reasonably clean, although Petunia would always complain about the tiniest things. Personally, Vernon thought she was being a germaphobe, and shared Harry's opinion that it was fine as it was, although he would never admit it.

Dudley, the spoiled pig that he was, had attempted to bully the boy; however Harry had always managed to leave the boy stumped or simply slipped away while Dudley went on about how Harry was a freak and should do as he said.

'The look' had never come upon his face again, and the boy remained cool and collected at all times.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Petunia Dursley was washing the dishes, while her husband was watching the news on his television. Their perfect, faultless son was upstairs watching his _own_ television. The fourth child, Harry Potter, was ignored, although he was no doubt in one of three places: In his room, outside (he often frequented the park), or on the roof, as there was a window in his room that allowed him relatively easy access to the tiled surface.

In fact, that was exactly where the boy was: Hanging out on the roof by his window, reading a book. However, this was not your average book that could easily be found out in a random London bookstore. This book was a large, many paged tome by the name of _A Guide to Magical Self Defense, by Artemis Brown_. It was getting late, and the moon was an ivory crescent in the sky, giving a minimal amount of light down to the earth. The boy had a small flashlight tucked behind his ear, allowing a more appropriate amount of light to illuminate what he was reading.

He was oddly dressed, although given his situation it was not that surprising. His 'family' held no love for him, nor did he in return. He was clad in oversized, stitched up hand-me-downs that once belonged to his cousin, his pants held up only by a belt. Upon his face was a pair of broken glasses, mended by a strip of tape in the middle. His cousin had, several weeks ago, punched him in the face for being such a 'freak' and whatnot. Harry had responded in kind, planting his fist in Dudley's face. They had both been sent to the nurse with broken noses, and the two had received detention for two weeks.

People had been shocked that the shy, smaller child had responded to Dudley's attack so violently. They had all expected him to start crying, or run to a teacher. No, the thin, pale loner of the school had struck back with unexpected ferocity. Dudley had failed to pick on his little cousin ever again.

After that little incident, things had gone back to relative normalcy. Dudley continued to bully (with the exception of Harry, which caused him to be continuously followed by some of the smaller kids), teachers taught, and kids pointed and whispered about various things.

One day, however, everything changed…

The Dursleys and Potter were eating breakfast, which they former grudgingly admitted was very good, when there was a strange tapping sound at the window. It was an owl. Harry looked up, a satisfied smirk adorning his face, while his aunt and uncle snapped their heads up so fast that it was amazing that they hadn't given themselves whiplash.

"Dudley, go to your room," ordered Petunia. The large boy began to protest, but he was silence by a "DO AS I SAY YOUNG MAN!" Dudley was so frightened by the hostility in his mother's voice that he bounded up the stairs without argument.

There was an awkward silence as the owl at the window continued tapping its beak, a letter tied to its foot.

"It's here," Harry declared monotonously.

He stood and walked over to the window calmly. He unlatched the locks on the window, allowing the avian creature inside. It landed on the table, helping itself to some of Harry's water as the boy untied the letter from its foot. All the while, his aunt and uncle just sat, staring at the letter with pale and sweaty faces. Petunia drew herself away from the owl that had landed in front of her, and Harry began opening up the strange letter.

His hands felt the dry, heavy parchment as he unsealed the envelope, ripping the Hogwarts Seal in half. Inside of the envelope was another piece of parchment, which he unfolded. It read:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL

_of_ WITCHCRAFT _and_ WIZARDRY

Insert fancy wavy line here

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(_Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, _

_Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of wizards)_

_Dear Mr. Potter,_

_We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment._

_Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31._

_Yours Sincerely,_

_Minerva McGonagall, _

_Deputy Headmistress_

A rare smile came upon Harry's face as he read the letter. His face then returned to its normal, passive form as he looked up at his relatives. "Uncle Vernon, can you take me into London tomorrow?" Both males knew that it was not a question. It was a demand.

"Fine, it's not out of the way…" grumbled Vernon, who returned to his meal after Harry had sent the owl away with his response. "Just know that I'm not paying for your rubbish."

Harry shrugged and cleared his plate of the scraps, opting to return to his room. He sat on his bed, his back to the wall. He looked at the letter again, plans forming in his mind. He was one step closer…

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"Get in the car, boy. I'm not waiting for you," shouted Vernon from the bottom of the stairs. At his call, Harry calmly walked down the stairs, his face impassive as usual. "Alright, let's go, boy," grumbled Vernon as he and Harry headed for the car.

Vernon drove in silence, his face purple from the suppressed urge to yell at the boy. The boy, seemingly oblivious to his uncle's rage, continued to look over the supply list he had received.

UNIFORM:

Three sets of plain work robes (black)

One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear

One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)

One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)

Please note that all pupils' clothes should carry name tags.

COURSE BOOKS:

All students should have a copy of each of the following:

_The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) _by Miranda Goshawk

_A History of Magic _by Bathilda Bagshot

_Magical Theory_ by Adalbert Waffling ("Waffles…" murmured Harry.)

_A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration_ by Emeric Switch

_One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi_ by Phyllida Spore

_Magical Drafts and Potions_ by Arsenius Jigger

_Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_ by Newt Scamander

_The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self Protection_

OTHER EQUIPMENT:

1 wand

1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2)

1 set glass or crystal phials

1 telescope

1 set brass scales

PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS

"Boy, you better put that rubbish away… I don't want anyone to see you're freakish wa—"

"Stop here, that's the Leaky Cauldron," said Harry, oblivious to his uncle's ranting. The man began to go purple in the face, suppressing the urge to yell. "…were you saying something?"

"Just get out."

Harry shrugged and exited the car, not paying attention as his uncle drove off muttering angrily to himself. The boy looked up at the old, magically hidden bar and walked in. His nose was immediately assaulted by the stench of alcohol, the fumes from numerous pipes and other such things. Attempting to recall his last visit to Diagon Alley (which was nearly seven years ago), he sought out the brick wall that concealed the entrance to the wizarding shopping center.

"Excuse me, young man?" asked a bald, toothless man. "I'm Tom, the barkeeper. Are you trying to get into Diagon Alley?"

"Yes."

"Are your parents here?" asked Tom. Perhaps the child was a muggleborn?

"No."

Tomb blinked, his brow wrinkling in concern. "Where are they, child?"

"The Potter family cemetery, six feet underground in a large wooden box for two," said the boy, as if he were talking about the weather.

"Oh dear, I apologize, Mr. Potter. My condolences," said Tom.

"Wha…? Eh, whatever. Can you just open up the path for me?" asked Harry.

"Mr. Po—I mean, yes, of course," said Tom, confused by the young man's behavior. He seemed completely unaffected by the fact that his parent's were dead. Tom worried, as he had known James and Lily well. Part of him was furious that the boy had waved off his parents' deaths so easily, but on second thought, perhaps the boy was just trying to put it behind him.

Clearing his thoughts, Tom walked with Harry to the brick wall, tapping his wand on the bricks. When he finished, the bricks began to move and shuffle around, forming an archway. Beyond said archway was the bustling economic center of Magical Britain: Diagon Alley. Many witches and wizards prowled the streets, seeking deals and bargains as they shopped for school supplies, food, and other such things.

"Thanks," said Harry as he walked into Diagon Alley. Tom merely nodded and sealed the entrance once again before returning to the bar.

Harry attracted some queer looks as he walked through the wizarding alley in his oversized, hand-me-down muggle clothing. He seemed oblivious to it all, looking for the wizarding bank known as Gringotts. If he remembered correctly, it was a very large marble building…

"Oh, okay," said Harry, reading a sign at the entrance of the alley. It said, 'Gringotts is that way' with an arrow pointing at the building.

With his destination in sight, Harry made his way to the bank, weaving in-between the oncoming current of shoppers. As he walked, he heard several voices arguing over prices, brands, and other such things.

"Mommy, why does that boy have such weird clothes?" whispered a girl to her mother. Her mother, a portly red-headed woman scolded her daughter.

"Ginerva Weasley, it's rude to talk about people like that," she chided.

"Sorry…"

"Don't say sorry to me, Ginny, you should apologize to the bo—" the conversation continued, but Harry did not hear it as he entered the bank.

'Are my clothes really weird?' he thought to himself. He looked himself over, and resolved to get a new wardrobe. Now that he thought about it, moving around in his current state of dress was a major pain. The floppy clothing severely hampered his mobility, and the sheer size of it was heavy for his light frame.

"Excuse me," said a low, sneering voice. Harry looked up, seeing a goblin glaring at him. "May I help you, Mr.…?"

"Potter, and I'd like to access my vault," said Harry. He reached into his back-pocket and pulled out his vault key, which he had kept with him ever since… _it_ had happened. His parents were somewhat liberal with how many of his assets he could control at his age. Then again, it wasn't like he could just waltz into Diagon Alley at any time he wanted, so there was really no worry.

The goblin held out his hand so that he could make sure the key was legitimate. Harry handed him the key, digging his pinky into his ear as the goblin examined it. Deeming it to be genuine, the goblin handed Harry back his key.

"Griphook!" shouted the goblin. "Take Mr. Potter to his vault."

"Yes sir," said the smaller, younger goblin. He turned to Harry and gestured towards one of the large doors. "Please come with me." Harry followed Griphook as he lead him to the large doors, and Harry saw two things: The largest man he had ever seen (although his Uncle Vernon easily rivaled him in terms of girth), and a cart. "Please get inside of the cart. We'll be doing both of your vaults. Sorry, but we need to pool carts because of all the people buying school supplies for this year of Hogwarts."

"O' course, I don' mind," said the large man. He saw Harry, and his eyes widened. "Harry? That you?"

Harry looked up at the giant of a man and tilted his head. "Have we met?" The man seemed familiar… kind of…

Griphook looked at Harry somewhat incredulously. How do you forget about a man _that_ big?

Meanwhile, Harry continued to try and recall who the man was. The large man shifted awkwardly. "I'm Hagrid, knew yer parents." Harry tilted his head, looking at Hagrid.

"Oh, okay," he said after a few minutes.

Hagrid and Griphook sweat dropped.

'Weird kid… or maybe he's just slow…' thought Hagrid. As the three boarded the cart, however, Hagrid began to have second thoughts about the child being 'slow.' 'Then again, he managed to get all the way here… I don' think Dumbledore sent anyone ter take 'im here. 'Sides, he's James and Lily's kid. He's gotta be sharp.'

Hagrid's inner monologue was interrupted, however, by a wave of nausea caused by none other than the cart's rapid and vigorous movements as it darted through the many stone tunnels deep under Gringotts. After several moments (or hours, as it felt like for poor Hagrid), Griphook finally stopped at one of the vaults.

"Please hold this," requested Griphook, holding the lamp to Hagrid. The man took it while the goblin walked over to the vault door. It was tall and imposing, and oddly with no lock or any sort of outside mechanism. Griphook ran his finger down the center of the vault door, and a staccato of gears and switches was heard, reverberating throughout the chamber.

"Tell me, Mr. Potter, what do you think would happen if anyone other than me were to touch this door?" asked Griphook, waiting patiently as the vault door unlocked.

"…I'm guessing something cruel and probably resulting in a horrible death," said Harry, sounding bored.

"More or less," said Griphook. There was a loud clang as the vault door opened. Slowly, tediously, as if unveiling the very thing that held the universe together, the doors spread open. Torches lit within the vault, illuminating the interior to reveal…

…a little brown package.

"Lamp, please," said Griphook. He took the lamp from Hagrid, who hurried into the vault and pocketed the package. With the giant's business done, the three returned to the cart and moved onto their next stop: Harry's vault.

"Key please," asked Griphook, standing next to the vault. Harry handed it to him, and his eyes squinted as the vault door opened, revealing mounds of gold that shined and glittered in the torch light.

Hagrid looked at the gold in awe.

Griphook tapped his foot, waiting for this to be done with. He had other customers to tend to.

Harry… was Harry.

"…huh."

Seemingly oblivious, or simply indifferent, to his newfound apparent wealth, Harry grabbed a little bit of everything and dumped it into an old backpack that Dudley once owned. When he got a good amount, Harry lung the pack over his shoulder, it holding onto his slight frame on a single strap, and he returned the cart and took his key back from Griphook.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

After he had gotten his gold, silver, and bronze money (he idly wondered why wizards didn't just switch to paper money… it was easier to carry), he looked around the alley. The nearest shop was the Madam Malkin's. His destination set, Harry proceeded towards the robes shop, intent on getting some decent clothing. Upon entering the shop, he found that only one worker was available, as all others were running about and attending to other customers.

"Hogwarts, dear?" asked one of the assistants. Harry nodded, and she waved him onto a stool. "Alright then, let's get your measurements."

With a wave of her wand, a strip of tape-measure began flying and looping around him, taking every measurement from his height to the width of his pinky-nail. Why it needed to know that, he had no idea. After taking sufficient measurements, the woman returned with a roll of black cloth, a needle, thread, and scissors. With a wave of her wand, the robes began taking shape on Harry.

"You're going to Hogwarts as well, I presume?" asked a voice. Harry looked over and saw a pale, white blonde haired boy on the stool across from him.

"Yes," said Harry.

"What house do you think you'll be in," asked the boy. "Oh, my apologies; I'm Draco Malfoy." The boy stood up straighter, and seemed to be waiting for something. Harry gave him a blank look. Draco stared at him incredulously. "Do you know who I am?" he asked, sounding affronted.

"No, not really," said Harry, blowing a lock of hair out of his face.

Malfoy's eyes bugged out of his head. "Well, I'll have you know that I am the heir to the Most Noble and Ancient House of Malfoy, one of the oldest pureblood families in Britain!"

"…"

"…"

"…oh, okay."

"Gah!"

Before Malfoy could renew his tirade, however, a tall, pale, and blonde woman walked into the shop. "Draco?" she asked. "Ah, there you are. Have you been fitted?"

"Yes ma'am, I just finished," said one of the employees. The woman, apparently Malfoy's mother, paid for the robes and hurriedly exited the shop with her son in tow. The younger Malfoy glared at Harry angrily, who ignored him and appeared to be more interested in the crow that had landed by the window, and had begun pecking at a dead mouse.

After the woman had finished with Harry's robes, he had spent a few extra minutes buying a few pairs of muggle jeans and t-shirts, mostly in black, red, and tan. He also bought a black cloak, which had been charmed so that it blended in perfectly for the shadows, and was the ultimate stealth tool when traveling at night. However, in the day, or in any illuminated area, it was useless.

"Why would you want to buy that?" asked the woman as he picked it out.

"I plan on giving Hogwarts hell," said Harry bluntly. The woman giggled, and sent him away.

With that accomplished (and after using the changing rooms to put on a pair of decent jeans and a black t-shirt), Harry moved onto the next shop: Flourish and Blotts. Upon entering the store, he immediately sought out his school books, before moving onto other books, such as _Dueling: an Introduction_ by William Malone, _How to Kick the Other Guy's Ass_ by David Norris, _Not So Harmless Fun_ by Christopher Mays, and _Curses, Shields, and Other Spells _by Benjamin Davis. He had also grabbed a few books on Potions, such as _Various Brews of Interesting Properties_ by Larry Snell, and _Bubbly Stuff that Does Cool Shit_ by Vincent the Smart-ass.

Despite numerous difficulties (such as weight), Harry managed to get all of the books to the check-out counter. After paying for all of them, the shop-keeper was kind enough to put a feather-light charm on his backpack. He left the shop, but found himself having difficulty making his way to Ollivander's, as a large crowd had converged by the door.

"It's him!"

"The Boy Who Lived…"

"I shook his hand! I shook his hand!"

Standing on the tips of his toes, Harry managed to catch a glimpse of what all of the ruckus was about. It was a boy around his own age, dressed in freshly pressed and clean robes with brown hair cut neatly. He had just walked into the shop, his robes trailing behind him as he walked through the doors. Many people pressed their faces against the windows, trying to get another glimpse of the young boy.

Harry shrugged, knowing that the crowd would disperse eventually, and resolved to head towards the Apothecary. After spending about twenty minutes getting his potions supplies, he headed back out, and was satisfied that the crowd was gone. He entered the old shop, the bell ringing as he went through the door.

"Ah, hello Mr. Potter," said a voice. Harry turned around. A man, apparently Mr. Ollivander, stood in front of him. He seemed to be giving the boy a piercing look, and with a flick of his wand a roll of measuring tape began examining his various limbs and such. "Well, let's not waste time then. Which is your wand arm?"

"My right," said Harry as the tape measured the space between his nostrils.

"Ah, very good then." Mr. Ollivander began moving among the shelves taking out boxes and reading their labels. "Try this one; Eleven inches, dogwood, phoenix feather."

Harry gave it a wave, only to have it snatched away by the wandsmith.

"Thirteen inches, mahogany, unicorn tail hair." Mr. Ollivander handed him another wand, and consequently lost a chair as Harry waved it. "Evidently not the one."

Time passed, and hours went by as Harry received wands, only to either have them snatched away or cause destruction to Mr. Ollivander's property. However, the man showed continuous patience and failed to show any anger at the destruction. "Tricky customer, I see… you seem very unpopular with the wands. After all, it is they who choose the wizard, not vice-versa.

"Try _this_ one, fourteen inches, phoenix feather, made from yew," said Ollivander. "A very capable wand; can excel in just about any subject. Unfortunately, such a wand was also the one of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and thus has fallen out of style as of late."

The minute Harry's fingers touched the wand, he felt… right. It was a rush, and he felt a sensation rush through his body and into the wand, then back to him again. He waved it a little, causing crimson sparks and vapor to spread in front of him.

"I'd say that's the one! I think we can expect great things from you, Mr. Potter…" said Ollivander. Harry paid for the wand and exited the shop, not bothered at all by the fact that his wand was nearly identical to that of the most recent Dark Lord.

Ollivander stared at the boy as he headed for the Leaky Cauldron, rubbing his chin. "Indeed… we can expect great things from you… perhaps even greater than from the Boy Who Lived…"

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Harry lay in his bed, twirling his wand in his hands. He had rented out a room at the Leaky Cauldron, knowing that his uncle would not be picking him up. The sun blazed against the horizon, giving the sky an orange hue. He had looked through his books in advance upon getting his room, and was very tempted to start practicing… but he knew that he'd get an owl from the Ministry faster than he could spit.

However… he had a plan.

After the sun had set, and the night had taken hold over the Alley, Harry covered himself in the cloak he had bought at Madam Malkin's.

AN: Yo. So yeah, I bet you guys noticed I failed to get Harry a pet… well, frankly, Harry doesn't want one. See you next chapter…

_**Crimson, Chapter Four: Adventures in Knockturn Alley!**_


	4. Adventures in Knockturn Alley

_A Nameless Heretic Production:_

_**Crimson:**_

_**Chapter Four: Adventures in Knockturn Alley**_

It was not too difficult to slip out of his room. Harry, with the cloak wrapped tightly around him, stuck to the darkest corners and areas of the halls, creeping slowly with deliberate and careful steps, as to not make too much of a ruckus. While the cloak made him virtually undetectable in all other aspects, he could still be _heard_ if he was too careless with his actions.

After several long, agonizing minutes, Harry finally made it to what may prove to be one of his greatest obstacles on his quest for that which he sought; Stairs. From what he had heard (in more ways that one), they were notoriously creaky and it was nearly impossible for one to make there way down the steps without making a sound, which usually awoke Tom the barkeeper in an instant, due to his uncannily sharp ears and his nature as a light sleeper.

However, Harry had a solution. It was stupid and risky, running the chance that he could fall and make his actions well known. Slowly, Harry positioned himself between the stair-rail and the wall, planting his hands before him and fastening his feet to the rail. Slowly, he slid and climbed down the steps.

'Move hand, slide foot, move hand, slide foot, move hand, slide foot…' This mantra played through his head continuously, never stuttering or faulting as he descended to the bottom floor of the magical inn. About halfway through, he took a chance and removed his hand from the wall and wiped some sweat from his brow, barely keeping himself up with on arm. Quickly, he replaced his hand on the wall without making a sound.

'Almost there.'

He then restarted his internal mantra, moving his hand and sliding his foot, one after the other. Harry's movements were quick, precise, and stealthy. Before he knew it, he had made it to his destination. His feet touched solid ground.

Wasting now time, Harry made his way to the arch that led into Diagon Alley. Lucky for him, it had been left open for the night, thanks to a suggestion that Harry had slipped to a drunken wizard. "Now, say someone wanted to go outside this beautiful evening… you wouldn't want everyone woken up by the bricks shifting, would you?" Harry had said. The wizard, in his impaired state, had agreed and opened the path as everyone headed for bed.

Harry dashed through the arch, running on the balls of his feet and doing his best not to make too much noise. He avoided areas illuminated by the light of the moon, sticking to the shadows cast by the shops and other buildings. The enchantments of the cloak bent whatever light revealing his presence, making him completely invisible in the darkness. If a man or woman were standing a hair's breadth from his face, they would be none the wiser of his presence.

As he ran, sprinted, dashed, and vaulted from shadow to shadow, his mind raced. What would he find in Knockturn Alley? Could he find something that would allow him to practice magic without Ministry interference? Failing that, could he find anything useful that wouldn't twist and warp his mind and soul, reducing him to a mindless killing machine that would destroy everything around it, including itself? Or were all those things his parents told him about the Dark Arts complete bullshit?

He shook his head. This was not the time; he needed to concentrate on making it to Knockturn Alley. Despite Diagon Alley's good reputation for being a friendly block, at night it was very intimidating… especially with a drunk or two stumbling about.

'Huh… you'd think they'd have gotten home by now,' thought Harry.

One of the drunks tripped over his own feet and started walking in the opposite direction, while another yelped in pain as he ran into a sign that was hardly visible in the moonlight.

'…'

Harry carefully weaved in between the pack of drunken wizards, careful not to touch them and alert them that he was within the area. While they were drunk, and possibly wouldn't notice him regardless, they could also freak out and start firing spells randomly.

He quickly fled the area, his eyes set on the sign proclaiming the entrance to Knockturn Alley. The calls, yelps, and other such noises from the drunks died away as the distance between he and them grew, their voices fading away into the dark, quiet tranquility of the summer night.

As the young wizard approached the sign pointing to the infamous alley, rumored to be purely dedicated to the darkest and foulest of magics, he slowed. Thinking about it, the alleys reputation was rather ridiculous. If it was as dark as they say, the ministry wouldn't let it run business and whatnot, would they? The Dark Arts were, by definition, illegal. Why would the ministry, a 'light' establishment of government, allow such a thing to continue under their very noses?

'Yep… people are stupid,' Harry concluded.

However, that was not to say that the old, gnarly looking witch that now stood three feet from him was really a nice old lady that would love to offer him milk and cookies devoid of any poisons and/or potions that would affect his body in a manner not to his liking.

He quickly, but silently, moved away from the elderly witch and continued his trek into Knockturn Alley, keeping one eye out for potential threats, and the other eye open for potential aids. He froze, hearing a sound. Stepping out of the shadows, an old man stalked his way through the alley. His eyes were glassy, and he breathing heavy.

Harry kept his breathing even, and kept himself against the wall of one of the shops, blending in with the darkness cast by the awning. The old man was mumbling to himself what sounded like gibberish.

'I need to be careful…' thought Harry, who stiffened when the man suddenly stopped.

"Need ta take a leak…" he mumbled.

Harry, glad that the man had not sensed his presence, quickly fled from the yellow stream of evil before it could hit him, and continued his trek towards the shop that he _knew_ must have held some, ah, _interesting_ items that would aid him in some of his less than noble/law-abiding ventures.

As he continued to walk down the alley, carefully keep his distance from the more unsavory characters he came across (which proved to be almost all of them) while sticking to the darkness, he found a shop that would doubtlessly answer to his needs;

Borgan and Burkes.

Looking around to see if anyone was in the vicinity, Harry concluded that the close was clear for him to enter the shop. He carefully eased the door open. Thanks to his slim form, he managed to slip through the door without having to open it wide enough to set off the bell.

The shop was dimly lit, with only a candle in the back room casting any form of illumination. Harry squinted, barely making out the counter. Distantly, he could here an old man grumbling. He lowered his hood, his pale face almost glowing in the darkness, and he walked up to the counter. He waited for a couple seconds, and then reached to ring the bell on the counter-

-however, this action was interrupted as an old, gnarled hand snatched the bell away.

"What do you want, brat? Especially at this time of night?" said the old man, his voice gruff and scratchy. Harry looked at him, showing not a hint of fear. "…do you even know what time it is?"

"Night-time," answered Harry. The old man, apparently Mr. Borgan, sighed in frustration.

"Ah, to hell with it… what do you want?" he demanded. His eyes were bloodshot, so Harry guessed the man had been up for a long time. "I don't have all bloody night, dammit!"

"Whatever… I'm looking for something that will allow me to do magic outside of school." Harry angled his head form side to side, popping his neck as the old man gave him a look. The man nodded, a sneer forming on his lips, and he went into the back.

As he waited, Harry decided to entertain himself by browsing the many shelves of the shop. He found various things, ranging from skulls to hands that looked as if they'd been mummified. He had even found a clutch of shrunken heads… what those actually did, he hadn't a clue.

Eventually, he came across a stack of books. There were three piles: Cursed, Dark Arts, and Unknown. Harry, somewhat curious, began leafing through the Dark Arts books. He picked a couple out, 'The Truth of Darkness,' and 'Hatred be Thy Ally.'

He looked at the unknown pile, tilting his head to the side. One of the books had an entirely blank, brownish cover with a belt keeping it closed. He tried to open it, but to no avail. The lock refused to come loose. The pages even seemed to be petrified, staying in place when he brushed his fingers against them.

"Find anything you like, brat?" asked Mr. Borgan sarcastically. Harry felt the shop shake a little bit, and turned around to see the old man bent over above a large stone. The stone was glowing faintly, and had numerous runes carved into it. It looked quite heavy. "The stone will be fifty galleons. As for the books, I'll sell them all to you for twenty."

"What does the stone do?" asked Harry. Mr. Borgan sighed, popping the kinks out of his back, and began to explain.

"The ministry keeps track of underage magic by monitoring magic in the household. Now, if the kid comes from a magical family, the ministry just writes it off as their parents doing it. They trust their parents to enforce the rules," he said. "Now, what this stone does is, it interferes with the ministry's sensors, making it so they can't detect any magic. It casts a ward to do so, and I'd say that a ward-stone this size would cover a room or two. Unfortunately for you, if you shrink it, its effect will become nullified, so you'll have to bring it to wherever you want it to be in full size. A levitation charm should work, and you can slap a cloaking spell on it too."

"…how do I do that?" asked Harry. The old man rolled his eyes, pulling out his own wand. After a series of wand-movements, the massive stone disappeared.

"Alright, brat, you got a wand with you?" he asked, obviously getting cranky. Harry pulled out his yew wand. "Alright, now, swish and flick, and say 'wingardium leviosa.'"

Harry did so, and felt a strange pull from his wand. He could almost 'feel' the stone rising, as if his hand had extended and grasped it. He steadily waved his wand side to side, experimenting with the spell. Mr. Borgan swore as a tower of books started to fall.

"Watch where you're moving that thing, you bloody idiot!"

"Oh… sorry," said Harry, his head tilted to the side as he experimented with the spell. He reached into his cloak, and pulled out his back-pack filled with gold. "Here, keep the change."

Squawking, Mr. Borgan had just barely caught the backpack before he almost collapsed under the weight. He looked inside, his eyes wide. "P-pleasure doing business with you, Mr.…?—Hey, where'd you go?" Harry had disappeared, leaving a very confused, but grateful, Mr. Borgan. "Huh… sneaky li'l bastard, that brat."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Harry James Potter was currently in a state that under normal circumstances he would never even get close to… he was in a hurry. Note only that, but he was running at breakneck speed, dragging the ward-stone behind him. Now, when Harry Potter ran, there was usually a damned good reason… not that he ever stuck around to figure out what it was. He knew several things about himself… he didn't like being hassled, he had a thing for spicy food, and he was an easy-going guy. However, he also knew that he was weak, from a highly critical (but at the same time realistic) point of view.

Now, what did the weak do when they sensed danger? Simple;

They ran their sorry little butts off.

He wasn't sure when he'd developed his little 'danger sense,' assuming that that was what it was. Sometimes, he'd just get a feeling… a bad one. He hypothesized that it was a natural defense mechanism that had become active when his family was killed, but it really didn't matter where it came from… what mattered was that it'd kept him alive thus far.

His with adrenaline flowing through his veins and blood keeping his brain and muscles moving, he flew down the notorious alley, his stealth cloak held tightly around him. His mind was entirely focused on two things; Keeping the ward stone in range of himself, and running.

He weaved between various pedestrians stalking the night, and managed to get past them without notice. After making enough space between himself and Knockturn Alley, and thus entering Diagon Alley, Harry allowed himself to calm down. Rational thought began to overpower his base instincts, and he assessed his current situation.

He had a big rock that could keep the Ministry from knowing he was doing magic, it was three in the morning, he was an exhausted eleven year old boy, and it would be a _major_ pain in the ass for him to get the stupid rock to his room at Privet Drive…

'Well, one would think that there is some sort of displacement spell that I can find at Hogwarts… I'll just shrink the rock for now and take care of it later,' he decided. With a tap of his wand, the stone shrunk to a more manageable size (about the size of his fist), and he pocketed the enchanted stone. He also slipped his wand up his sleeve, and made his way back to the Leaky Cauldron. There was now way he'd be getting any sleep tonight… but Tom might try to check on him in the morning.

After carefully reentering his room (he had somehow managed to climb back up the stairs the same why he had climbed down earlier, except in reverse), he set his newly acquired purchases into his trunk. He'd have to keep those dark arts books under raps… but the blank one still puzzled him.

He sat down on the bed, holding the book in his hand. It was a simple, dark leathery brown color. The lock keeping it closed was a generic, lock-n-key style security feature with a strap, except without the keyhole. Harry had, naturally, attempted to simply manhandle it open, but that failed miserably. The young wizard figured that he'd hurt his fingers more than the book's security.

About an hour later, after trying every conceivable method that was conventional (to him, at least… the author is still unsure what he was intending to do with the bubblegum and toilet paper). He had even risked an unlocking charm with his wand, and smirked as no owl ever entered the room. He supposed that the ministry could not differentiate between his magic and the adults in the inn. The book's lock still held strong, refusing to yield what secrets might lie within the enigmatic tome. Harry, lying on his back with the books suspended in the air by his hands, had a mind that was now racing.

'I _did_ find it in a dark shop…' The thought drifted through his mind. He shrugged, sitting up. 'Eh, what the hell?'

Pulling out a pocketknife he'd swiped off of Dudley, Harry made a small incision on his finger, and starting smearing his blood on the book. His blood touched the cover, the lock, and even the pages as he attempted this method of finding a way into whatever arcane magics, or bizarre stories of any deranged wizard or witch who kept this as a diary, but his attempt failed, and all he had accomplished was giving himself a cut finger and making a book bloody.

While he looked unruffled, Harry ran his fingers through his hair in mild agitation. Resolving to tackle this little puzzle at a later time, after he had more complicated and powerful spells under his belt, Harry just dumped the book off in his trunk, slamming the large container shut. Hopefully, he'd be able to find a solution at Hogwarts.

AN: Short... much too short… sorry guys.


	5. The Scarlet Train

AN: Howdy, folks! I'm glad to see you all again. :)

Sorry this took so long… I'll admit it; I was being a lazy bastard. But here I am now:D

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Five: The Scarlet Train **_

It had been several weeks ago, that Harry had snuck out into Knockturn Alley and bought some 'extracurricular' supplies. He had assimilated the knowledge held within his books quickly, and had also done some practice. It had finally occurred to him that he could do magic anywhere in Diagon Alley uninhibited… how could the ministry differentiate between _his_ magic and the thousands of other witches and wizards? Simple; they couldn't.

Despite being constantly hungry and tired from all the practice and such, Harry had gained a very good grasp on the first year curriculum and was confident that he was a competent duelist for his age… which really wasn't saying much. Most people didn't get into dueling until their teen years, and even then they were normally supervised by their teachers or parents. Harry was forced to learn by himself, but he was just fine with that. He'd grow strong on his own.

It wasn't as if there was anyone out there for him anyway. He'd always been alone…

Just him.

Nobody else.

He wanted nobody.

He needed nobody.

He'd be the strongest, alone.

"Excuse me, are you doing magic?" asked an excited, female voice. Harry was jerked from his inner monologue, and saw that he was mindless performing wand movements, which had been ingrained into his muscle memory.

Harry looked up from his magical tool to see a bushy brown haired girl around his age, tapping her foot with her arms folded.

"Hermione?" called out another voice, this one sounded masculine and worried. "Hermione Jane Granger, where are you?"

The girl looked up and waved her arms. "Over here, daddy!" she shouted back. A moment later, the girl's apparent caretakers found her.

"Hermione, how many times do I have to tell you not to wander off?" scolded a woman, apparently the girl's mother. "Especially here, who knows what could happen! And please, don't shout so much."

"Sorry mommy… but this boy was doing magic!" she said, pointing at Harry.

Harry gave her a blank look. "…so?"

"It's against the rules!" insisted the girl.

"…"

"…you could get in trouble," elaborated the girl.

"…oh, okay," said Harry, looking unconcerned.

The girl's left eye twitched slightly, and she face-vaulted. Harry shrugged and stood up, heading up to his room. He had some more spells to practice… If nothing else, the mysterious book (which he was still unable to open) made a good target dummy, as it proved to be indestructible. He didn't want to have to deal with an angry Tom for blowing up his walls.

In a couple of days time the Hogwarts Express would be leaving for the school and muggleborn first years were piling in from across the country. As Platform Nine and Three Quarters proved to be an elusive quarry over the years due to the anti-muggle charms that had been placed on it, the Ministry had decided to escort the children to the train themselves, with the parent's permission of course. So now the future first years were bunking in the Leaky Cauldron so that they could take a bus to Kings Cross, and thus find there way to the train and be a step closer to their futures in this new, magical realm.

The inn had been quite crowded as a result, and Harry had retreated into his room for the most part. He had managed to keep the room to himself, thankfully, and not had to bunk with another child. Years of isolation from others had taught Harry the value of solitude… the value of company, however, remained a mystery to him.

"Reducto!" The vase he had transfigured was incinerated, and Harry fell to his knees, panting hard, and dragged himself into the bed. He had been practicing spells for hours now, and had even skipped dinner. After all but killing himself from his intense training regiment in the arts of the wand, he was even having trouble keeping his eyelids open.

Obviously, he was completely exhausted, asleep before his head even hit the pillow.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

_Drip-drip-drip-drip…_

Weakling.

_Emerald green eyes lazily surveyed the bloodied grounds. Bodies littered the entire area, from victims of the kill curse lying intact to mutilated corpses that had fallen victim to some of the most vicious of magics. A gentle breeze blew across his skin, causing his hair to wave slightly. _

Weakling.

_Harry began walking towards the large, strangely ominous house that once held some of his happiest memories, such as birthdays, Christmas, bed time stories, and other such things that were often fantasized about by normal children. Once warm and inviting, the house now looked quite intimidating._

Weakling!

_Harry entered the house through the back door, which stood ajar. He paid no mind as his bare feet dipped into the spots of blood. Blood was not foreign to his eyes. He could here something… whispering…_

Weakling!

_A cold hand gripped his shoulder, long fingernails ripping into his ski-_

KNOCK

KNOCK

KNOCK

"Mr. Potter, breakfast is ready! The bus will be leaving in a few moments!" shouted Tom through the door, his fist pounding on the wood. "I'm coming in!" The doorknob twisted, and Tom opened the door to see a sleeping Harry Potter sitting up in bed, a clueless look on his face. "Mr. Potter?"

"Oh… right… breakfast," said the boy. With a great yawn he hopped out of bed, still in his clothes from the night before. "I'll be right down."

"As you say, Mr. Potter," said Tom. "I'll keep your usual seat open."

"Wha? Oh, right. Thanks," said Harry distractedly. He had flung open his trunk and dug around the myriad of possession, before pulling out a slightly wrinkled t-shirt and jeans. The door made a satisfying 'click' as Tom closed the door.

Taking a cold, quick shower, Harry became a bit more awake, or at least as awake as he usually was. Some would claim that he was perpetually drowsy, while others would say that he was always sleep-walking. After putting on the t-shirt and jeans, he slipped on some sandals and made his way down into the bar, his wand in his pocket and a book in hand.

The bar was, of course, incredibly noisy and crowded, various first years and such running around and talking excitedly. As Harry approached his usual spot (a secluded corner of the bar) he tilted his head to the side, narrowly dodging a biscuit that had been thrown his way by two rowdy boys. After making his way through the menagerie of what was supposed to be the most evolved creature on the planet earth, Harry took a seat and began reading over one of his dueling texts, one of the few he had not yet gotten around to reading.

"Here you are, Mr. Potter," said Tom, laying down a plat of eggs, bacon, and toast. Harry gave a grunt of thanks, tossing Tom a galleon for the meal. "Just call if you need anything." With that, the toothless man went on to attend to the other children, as the ministry was paying him an extra half of what he usually made in a month just for watching the children that particular day. Tom was an honest man, and would definitely give the Ministry, and the tax-payers, their money's worth.

Harry continued reading, one hand on the book and the other transferring his food from the plate and into his waiting jaw. A shadow fell over his book, and he looked up to see the girl from the day before standing behind him.

"Um… hi," she said awkwardly. Harry tilted his head. "About yesterday… that was rude of me and I'm sorry. I guess technically you weren't breaking any rules since we haven't gotten any formal instructions that students can't do magic outside of school, but I heard some others talking about it and I got all worried and I saw you doing magic so I got worried and when I see someone breaking a rule I just can't help my-"

She halted mid-syllable when she realized that Harry had scooted his chair to the side so that the sunlight fell back onto his book, uninhibited by her form, and continued eating and reading. A shade of red appeared on her face, and her eyes narrowed.

"Are you even listening to me?" she asked.

"…you say something?" Harry looked up from his book, his fork sticking out from his mouth.

Hermione sighed. "Never mind… can I sit here?"

Harry shrugged. "Whatever." He returned to his reading, sipping his drink as he turned a page. Hermione sat across from him, her hands folded in her lap and she looked around, seemingly enthralled by her surroundings.

"OH!" she suddenly exclaimed. Harry, with an imperceptible roll of the eyes, looked up. "I'm sorry, I never asked your name. I'm usually more polite, but I've just been so excited latel- Are you even listening to me?" she demanded.

Harry, having finished his breakfast and read enough for the moment, had evidently fallen asleep in his chair. His head hung forwards, his bangs covering his eyes, with his arms at either side, and the book lying wide open on the desk. Hermione opened her mouth to say something, but found herself at the loss for words. His breathing was level and easy, without any sort of snoring.

Hermione could've called it cute… but she was angry right now, so Harry's adorable slumbering visage failed to come to her attention.

"Wake up!" she hissed, throwing a rolled up napkin at him. He groaned slightly, raising his head. Hermione flinched upon seeing his bloodshot eyes. "Oh, sorry… goodness, did you even sleep last night?" she said worriedly.

"I got an hour or two… why?" asked Harry. Hermione's jaw dropped.

"You need more sleep than that!" she shouted frantically. People turned around, eyebrows raised. Harry started feeling rather uncomfortable. "The average person needs at least eight, honestly! What were you doing all night?"

"…" Harry had fallen asleep again. Hermione sighed and went to her own breakfast, trying not to look too desperate for companionship… she had thought that maybe, just maybe, she could've found a friend in 'her' world.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"Harry, the bus is here," said Tom, shaking the boy awake. Harry raised his head, a short stream of drool going down his face, and blinked. "Your trunk has already been loaded up."

"Oh… thanks Tom." Harry got out of his chair, tucking the book under his arm, and walked towards the bus. It was almost full, as he was one of the last kids on, and nearly all of the seats already had two people in them. There weren't any empty ones, and he resolved to just sit at the nearest open seat. Next to him was a black boy who was preoccupied with playing a Gameboy. If Harry remembered correctly, the boy's name was Dean Thomas.

The engine roared to life, and Harry and the boy next to him found themselves to be pinned to their seat as the bus drove through the streets at speeds that simply could _not_ be legal. However, Harry seemed unperturbed by the blatantly dangerous velocity of the bus and was content with catching up on some sleep. The other children were screaming in terror, or excitement, while the chaperones staid in their seats, reading their news papers without too much trouble.

"Aye, can you believe that Borgan just went missing like that?" asked one of the adults, pointing at the article. "Without a trace… ya think some Death Eaters were after him? I'd heard he ratted out a few. Or maybe the Ministry was gonna raid his shop?"

"I don't know, mate," said his companion.

Several minutes later (which seemed like several _hours_ to the terrified first years, save for Harry), the bus stopped at Kings Cross, sending a child or two flying across the bus.

Harry awoke, yawned, and stood up, seemingly oblivious to the mess around him. He raised his eyebrows at the pile of children next to him, who were groaning. "Did I miss something?"

After getting everyone back on their feet, the children were led into King's Cross. While the chaperones were explaining how to get to the platform, Harry phased through the brick wall when nobody was looking.

Upon clearing that obstacle, Harry found himself on a very busy Platform, filled to the brim with people in robes and children going into the train. Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw the boy he had had the less than enjoyable encounter with in Madame Malkin's. He was slightly red in the face, as the woman assumed to be his mother was hugging him tightly and appeared to be crying. Another man, who looked much like the boy (his father, apparently) was rolling his eyes, his watch in hand.

Harry stumbled as a body bumped into his.

"Oops, I'm sorry!" said a voice. Harry turned around, fixing his glasses which had been thrown askew by the bump. Before him stood a girl…

A very short girl, of Asian descent it seemed. Her black hair, cut short at her shoulders, waved a bit as she shook her head in worry.

"I'm sorry, I wasn't looking where I was going," she said frantically, her hands held up in panic.

"It's alright," said Harry. He looked at the train, and noticed that the engine had started roaring. "The train is about to leave." With that, he left and entered the train.

Like the platform, the train's corridors were busy as students and future students ran about to their compartments, shouting at enemies and laughing with friends. Harry kept his eyes out, and found an empty compartment near the back of the train. He slid the door closed behind him, and with his surprisingly strong arms he managed to stow his trunk up above the seat. There was a shift below him and the engine roared like an angry bear as the train began moving, and Harry fell into his seat.

The compartment door slid open, and a brown haired head peaked inside. It was a boy, dressed in fine robes that showed off a muscular upper body.

"Hello, everywhere else is full," he said confidently, taking a seat across from Harry. Harry looked at him.

The boy looked at Harry.

Emerald met sapphire.

Although they did not know it, nor did anyone else at the time, those two children's rivalry would become the stuff of legend…

The boy shifted in his seat, brushing his fingers across the lightning bolt shaped scar on his forehead, and for some reason had a frown on his face.

"Hello, I'm Neville Longbottom, the Boy-Who-Lived," he said, holding out his hand. "You're a muggleborn I assume? Don't worry if you're nervous, I'll help you out."

Harry arched an eyebrow, and slowly shook the boy's hand. "Harry Potter… and I think I can handle myself."

Neville's eyebrows rose at this, and he nodded. "Ah… I suppose we're two of a kind then; both of us victims of darkness. I heard about what happened to your family. My parents were killed that day as well…"

And so it went on like that, Neville going on about the day his parents were killed and that he was proclaimed the Boy Who Lived, and was taken in by Dumbledore, and then groomed to be Magical Britain's champion. If Harry were actually listening, he would've thought that the boy sounded as if he were high on himself.

"…so, what happened to you after Pettigrew sold out your parents?" finished Neville.

Harry blinked, seemingly contemplating what to say. He laced his fingers together, and tilted his head. "Life went on. I lived with my relatives."

Neville nodded, and waited, as if expecting Harry to elaborate. Upon his continued silence, Neville sighed and leaned back. "I see…" He pulled out his wand, spinning it in his hand. A smirk formed on his face. "Want to share spells?" He narrowed his eyes a little, waving his wand at the doorknob for the compartment. It warped, spun around, and now on the floor stood a toad, croaking. Neville bent down, taking the toad into his hands, chuckling. "Grandfather let me onto the train earlier, and I turned Trevor here into a doorknob for safekeeping. Pretty cool, I know. Transfiguration is one of my specialties."

Harry tilted his head, and pulls out his own wand. With a lazy, but definitive wave, the door was torn apart by an unseen force, the peaces left smoldering.

"Shredding curse… one of _my_ specialties," said Harry. Neville frowned disapprovingly.

"That's a rather… dangerous spell for a first year," he said suspiciously. "You wouldn't be planning to use that on anybody, would you?" He stroked Trevor, and gave Harry a steely eyed glare. "I'm afraid I don't condone use of any sort of dark art."

"If I need to, Longbottom," said Harry. His voice, once lazy and indifferent, was strangely… cold. His eyes were narrowed, and Neville suddenly felt as if he were staring into a cruel, enraged beast. Neville's face twisted into a small, almost imperceptible sneer.

The lights flickered for a moment.

"Anything off the trolley, dears?" asked a voice suddenly. The ominous atmosphere dissipated instantly, and the two boys jerked their heads towards the old woman pushing a trolley of magical treats. The Boy-Who-Lived's face softened.

"No thank you, madam… I'm afraid I have no appetite," said Neville, his voice falsely warm. Harry said nothing, although his face had returned to its normal impassive state. He shook his head slightly, and yawned.

The woman left, moving onto the next compartment.

Neville's face became hard again; he resumed his disapproving glare at Harry. "I'll have my eyes on you, Potter... and if you step a single bloody toe out of line on my watch, I'll make sure you're sorry for it." Harry gave a light smirk, with a look on his face that clearly said what he was thinking.

'_Bring it on._'

It was going to be a long, _long_ train ride.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

For the third time that day, the compartment door slid open. Harry and Neville, who had been continuing their little glaring contest, looked towards the offending door and saw three boys around their age. One was the blonde boy Harry had seen at the robe shop, and flanking him were two gorilla like children that looked as if they couldn't remember their own names if they hadn't been stitched into their underwear.

"I had heard that the Boy Who Lived was in this compartment," the boy said, his nose high in the air. He looked at Neville shrewdly, and held out his hand. "Draco Malfoy, Mr. Longbottom."

Neville stood and looked at the boy disdainfully, his face frowning. He took the boy's hand, and shook it briefly. "Pleased to meet you," he said, although he hardly sounded pleased. "May I help you?"

"Well, Neville, I was simply wondering if you'd like to make my acquaintance. My family is quite wealthy, and I have quite a bit of influence in Slytherin house… I believe that we could help each other out during our years at Hogwarts." Malfoy was smirking, a dark sparkle in his eyes.

Neville looked at Malfoy with a condescendingly disapproving expression. "No thank you, Mr. Malfoy… I prefer not to associate with back-stabbing reptiles."

Malfoy's face turned pink, and he sneered. "Watch your mouth, Longbottom," he hissed. "I've friends in high places…"

"As do I," countered Neville, folding his arms and leaning against the wall. The country side flashed past the window next to him, and he smirked.

The two pureblooded wizards glared at each other.

Harry was sleeping.

Resignedly, Malfoy backed off and turned his attention to the slumbering Harry Potter. He wrinkled his nose in contempt. "Ah, it's _you_… the slow one." Harry opened up one eye, and gave an unintelligible grunt. "I suggest you remember my name, mudblood. You'll be licking the dirt from my boots before long."

"…"

"Answer me dam—" Malfoy was thrown through the compartment with a wave of Harry's wand, and there was a sickening crack as Malfoy's skull slammed into a wall. "Merlin, what was the meaning of that?" he screeched.

"Just sod off, snake," sneered Neville. He flicked his wand, and the compartment door slammed shut. He turned to Harry, seeming to be mulling over what had just happened. "I suppose there's hope for you yet..."

Harry chuckled, and returned to his slumber. Neville huffed in annoyance, sitting back in his seat and pulling out a Defense against the Dark Arts book to read. Harry, despite appearing asleep, was actually doing something quite spectacular for someone his age.

He was practicing occlumency.

Now, he obviously wasn't very proficient, and he would not be for another year or two, but he was quite skilled for an eleven year old. He organized his thoughts, keeping them tucked away inside of the black abyss that no mortal man was allowed to tread within. His thoughts were safe… provided he didn't have someone of Snape's level ripping into his mind with his or her wand in Harry's face.

No, he wasn't quite ready to cope with that kind of mental assault.

In addition to his mental exercises, he was making his initial assessment of the famed Boy Who Lived…

His first impression was that the boy was a tad arrogant, incredibly judgmental (as he had branded Harry a 'bad guy' within five minutes of speaking with him), and in love with his own legend. However, he was nonetheless skilled with his magic and his wand, and would prove to be a worthy opponent in a duel… Now, while in a magic-only duel, Harry held no illusions that he was outclassed at the moment. However, Harry had an edge over Neville.

Harry wasn't afraid to throw himself into the duel… to throw in his life, his soul, his everything. He had no rules, no internal qualms about combat. Neville was still restricted by society's standards of playing 'fair.' Fools… true battle was never fair. The strong lived and the weak died… that was it.

That was everything.

Harry Potter came to understand that the day his family was torn apart by Death Eaters… the day his mother's humanity was nearly lost as she returned the favor, and the day he swore he would become stronger. He would not die a weakling.

The train began to slow.

"We're here… put your robes on," said Neville, exiting the compartment.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

After changing into his Hogwarts robes (actually, Harry simply slipped on the robe and stuck with his sandals, jeans, and t-shirt) he vacated the compartment, only to find himself behind a large crowd of students trying to get off of the train. Not having the patience to wait, he simply hopped out of a nearby window, landing on his feet with the grace of a feline.

A light shined into his face, coming from a large lamp that was held by Hagrid. "Firs' years, o'er here!" he shouted, waving his massive, trash-can lid sized hands. "Firs' years o'er here!"

Harry's stomach growled. 'I should've gotten something to eat… oh well, the feast should be pretty soon.'

"'Ello, Harry! Didja like the train ride?" asked Hagrid as he was surrounded by numerous first years. Harry simply gave a shrug, and Hagrid gave a booming laugh. "All right, I s'pose you lot are hungry. Follow me."

The giant of a man led the children away from the other students, who had been getting into carriages pulled by dark, skeletal looking winged horses, and led to the shore of the lake. Harry counted at least a dozen small boats, and snagged one of the last ones. Behind him were three other first years; a tall red haired boy who looked slightly harassed, the Granger girl, and a blonde boy with curly hair and a pudgy face.

Hagrid, at the lead boat, held out a large pink umbrella and bellowed "Onward!" There was a slight shift, and Harry just managed to keep his balance as the boats sprang into motion, jutting across the water. Harry saw what appeared to be a large tentacle snaking through the water, just peaking above the surface. He smirked for a moment, recalling his mother's stories of how the giant squid had put her back into the boat after one of the other students pushed her into the water.

"Mind yer heads," said Hagrid. Harry looked up, and ducked below the low stone arch. He heard several gasps as the castle came into view, and Harry couldn't help but also admire the architecture a little bit. Hundreds of generations of witches and wizards had passed through this castle, learning the arts of magic and preparing for there futures... a pity that not all of them could live those futures out.

The boats stopped at the stone stairs, and Harry stepped out along with the other first years, and they were all lead by Hagrid to the large mahogany doors, which exceeded even the bearded man's prodigious height. He raised his bolder-sized fist and knocked hard on the door, eliciting rattle among the metallic appendages.

The door opened, revealing an elderly and stern looking woman with rectangular glasses and an emerald green cloak, her look completed with the archetypical witch's pointed hat. He looked at the students stonily, as if challenging them to misbehave under her watchful, catlike eyes. She spoke.

"Welcome, first years, to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I am Professor McGonagall. Now, before the feast may begin, you must all be sorted into your houses. There are four of them, each named after the four original founders of this school; Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin." She continued to look at them sternly. "These houses will be like your family, and your actions will either allow you to gain, or _lose_, points for your house. Come the end of the year, the house with the most points will be awarded the House Cup. Now, if you will please follow me."

She gestured towards the inner hall, and the children filed into the stone room while the woman entered another, apparently preparing what was to 'sort' them into their houses. Harry leaned against the wall, hidden in a shadowed corner, and observed his future classmates. The bulk of them were either in their own social cliques (purebloods, muggleborns, old friends, and the like), or crowding around Neville while he obliged them with stories of his training and the day he became the Wizarding World's champion.

Suddenly, there was a staccato of gasps and screams when the room was filled with numerous silvery figures, each conversing in cultured (and some very archaic) tongues. Harry tilted his head upwards, scrutinizing the apparitions. They were ghosts.

"…honestly, it's worse and worse every year! Something must be done about peeves," argued one of the ghosts. Another, in the image of a rather wide friar, shook his head.

"I think he deserves another chance, I mean, he's rather funny if you take the time to get used to him," he placated. He looked down, as if he had just noticed the first years. "Ah, hello children! Allow me to welcome you to Hogwarts. I hope to see you in Hufflepuff!"

The doors opened, and the ghosts beckoned them to go. "It's time, see you soon!"

With that, the ghosts slipped through the walls and the students filed out of the room, and into a large, grand hall. There were five tables, four for each house (as they were filled with students) and one for the faculty. Harry looked up at the ceiling, and raised his eyebrows at the image of the night sky.

"The ceiling is charmed to show the sky," said a voice. Harry looked to his side, and saw Hermione next to him. "I read about it in _Hogwarts, a History_," she said proudly. Harry nodded, his stomach growling.

Suddenly, Harry thought he heard someone _singing_.

Now wait… some_thing_ was singing. To be more precise, it was an old, filthy looking hat.

_Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,  
But don't judge on what you see,  
I'll eat myself if you can find  
A smarter hat than me.  
You can keep your bowlers black,  
Your top hats sleek and tall,  
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat  
And I can cap them all.  
There's nothing hidden in your head  
The Sorting Hat can't see,  
So try me on and I will tell you  
Where you ought to be.  
You might belong in Gryffindor,  
Where dwell the brave at heart,  
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry  
Set Gryffindors apart;  
You might belong in Hufflepuff,  
Where they are just and loyal,  
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true,  
And unafraid of toil;  
Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,  
If you've a ready mind,  
Where those of wit and learning,  
Will always find their kind;  
Or perhaps in Slytherin  
You'll make your real friends,  
Those cunning folk use any means  
To achieve their ends;  
So put me on! Don't be afraid!  
And don't get in a flap!  
You're in safe hands (though I have none)  
For I'm a Thinking Cap!_

There was a round of applause; the hat took a bow from his seat on the stool. After the commotion died down, McGonagall picked up the hat and cleared her throat. "When I call you name, you must sit down here. I will then put the Sorting Hat on your head, and you will be sorted into your houses.

"'Abbot, Hannah!'" she announced. A girl stepped forward and sat down, and the Sorting Hat was rested on her pigtails. After a moment of contemplation, the hat gave a roar of 'HUFFLEPUFF!'

It continued like so, with students being sorted and sent into their houses accompanied by polite (or overly enthusiastic, depending on the house) applause. The Granger girl, Hermione was sorted into Griffindor, and the small girl Harry had bumped into at Platform Nine and Three Quarters, Su Li, was sorted into Ravenclaw.

"Longbottom, Neville!" intoned McGonagall. Silence reigned heavily as the Boy Who Lived gave a confident stride across the hall, sitting down on the stool. The hat rested on his head, and almost immediately shouted 'GRYFFINDOR!' Neville smiled broadly, and was accompanied by ridiculously loud applause from the Lion's Table, in unison with a chant of 'WE GOT LONGBOTTOM! WE GOT LONGBOTTOM!'

McGonagall, although smiling, gave a stern glare after a moment and the noise died down, allowing the sorting to continue. Harry, who was growing slightly antsy from his hunger, grew somewhat relieved as his turn came. He sat down at the table, and the hat was put upon his head, the brim covering his eyes.

"_Why hello there, Mr. Potter… hmmm… quite an ambitious one I see. Rules do not apply, eh? Oh my, that's a rather brutal outlook on life… yes… no prejudices against the more unsavory magics I see… ah, and you're studying occlumency, quite impressive! What's this…? Oh my, how amusing genetics can be, especially in the realms of magic! Who would've thought? _

"_You've got a healthy bit of courage and thirst for knowledge, but I don't think Ravenclaw or Gryffindor would suit you… no doubt the Bird's would bore you, as you need to be challenged from what I can see… and I shan't put you in the same house as Longbottom; You'd tear the place apart with your conflicting views, doubtlessly._

"_Indeed, a pity about your family. For what it's worthy, I'm sorry I ever allowed Tom Riddle into these hallowed halls… believe it or not, he also had potential in Gryffindor! Ha! Imagine that. Unfortunately, he chose the house of the snake, not that it is inherently bad in itself; just not exactly something I'd send a potential dark lord into. _

"_Oh, my apologies, I'm getting off track."_

"I forgive you," whispered Harry, feeling slightly agitated. He needed food… NOW!

"_Right then, I'd say you most definitely belong in _SLYTHERIN!"

Harry heard a slight gasp next to him, and a pause before the clapping started. He rolled his eyes as the hat was plucked off of his head, knowing that the woman next to him, who had been the teacher that was infinitely proud of his parents, felt betrayed at the moment.

He stood, and walked over to the Slytherin table, well aware that a certain hook-nosed man with greasy black hair was glaring a hole into the back of his wild-black-haired head. He sat down at the edge of the table, and sighed as he saw that there was no food yet.

The sorting continued without difficulty, ending with a black boy named Blaise Zabini being sorted into Slytherin. McGonagall put the hat away, and took her seat at the teachers table. At the center sat an ancient man in purple robes. He had long silvery hair and beard that reached his belt. He stood, and smiled at the students with twinkling eyes. It was Albus Dumbledore.

"Welcome," he started, with a surprisingly powerful voice, "to yet another year at Hogwarts! Now, before the feast can begin, a few announcements; As _most_ of you know," he gave a look at two red haired twins at the Gryffindor table, "The Forbidden Forest is exactly that; Forbidden. Also, all students are to refrain from stepping foot on the third floor corridor on the right hand side, unless of course they wish to die a most horrible and painful death."

There was a series of nervous giggles and laughter.

Dumbledore smiled. "Now, a few final words. Nitwit, blubber, oddment, tweak!"

He waved his hands, and several students gasped as the tables filled with food. Harry gave a rare smile and started piling food onto this plate, and dug in ravenously. His barbarian-esque table manners (or rather, simply his lack thereof) earned him some looks of disdain from his new housemates, although he did not notice. He continued eating, and filling his empty stomach with food until he could eat no more.

After stuffing himself, Harry sighed in content and pushed his plate to the side, giving a soft yawn. It had been a tiring day, and he could've used some sleep. After about an hour or so, Dumbledore stood again and dismissed the children, who were lead to their dorms by the prefects of their respective houses.

Harry stood and followed the crowd of Slytherins into the dungeons, where they were lead to what appeared to be an ordinary stone wall. Of course, Harry doubted that anything in the castle could count as _ordinary_.

The prefect, a tall sixth year boy with a beastly visage, turned around and gestured to the wall. "The password is 'Semper Purus,' don't forget it, and definitely don't let any of the other houses no about it." The wall shifted, and a doorway was revealed. The students advanced into the House, and found themselves in a large, green and silver room with a fire going. "This is the common room, as you can see. Girl's dorms are to the left, and the boy's dorms are to the right. Let's get some sleep!"

The children went up their respective dorms, each marked for their year. Harry was the last to enter the First Year boy's dorm, and found himself on the receiving end of many a glare, from Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, Nott, and Zabini.

Harry walked past them, not batting an eye, and with a great yawn he fell into his bed. He heard his new dorm-mates grumble in dissatisfaction at his presence, no doubt due to his mother's lineage, and entered their own beds.

The green eyed boy sighed as he took off his glassed and put them on the night stand, and shed his robes and put them on the trunk.

It would be a long year.


	6. Wand Waving and Troll Slaying

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Six: Wand Waving and Troll Slaying**_

Despite being deep within the dungeons of Hogwarts Castle, the Slytherin house became illuminated by the rising sun as dawn took place, magic similar to that of the great hall causing the sky to be mirrored by the windows of the serpent house. This gave rise to the light sleepers, who immediately dressed and headed for breakfast, talking animatedly about their plans for the following year.

However, as Harry Potter proved to _not_ be a morning person, that has little to do with this story. Two more hours passed, and Harry begrudgingly dragged himself out of bed and woke himself up more with a cold shower. After drying himself and changing into a new t-shirt and jeans, he slipped on his shoes (despite the castle growing colder, due to the approaching autumn) and his robes.

He ignored the snoozing Malfoy and his goons, silently exiting his dorm-room and making his way up the stairs and into the Great Hall. As classes did not begin until nine o'clock, the large dining room had yet to grow packed with ravenous students, the massive room instead played host to the semi-early risers of the school. Seating himself at the end of the Slytherin table, Harry began piling food onto his plate and eating far more than one would expect a boy of his size could handle. However, he proved to have a bottomless stomach and his ensuing massacre of the breakfast foods on his side of the table had the house-elves below working rapidly, to both their stress and to their joy.

After _finally_ ceasing to be hungry, Harry pushed his plate away and looked at his hand-me-down watch, and found that class would be starting in ten minutes.

With a flick of his wand, his books appeared next to him, encased in a bag, and he slung it over his shoulder. He was evidently oblivious to the curious stares he was receiving from the other students, and vacated the hall in his usual, lazy manner.

After several minutes of meandering and asking for directions by errant ghosts, Harry finally managed to get to his Transfiguration Class just before the bell rang, taking a seat in the back. Professor McGonagall, whom he learned was the teacher, appeared to not have been present. All that he could see, aside from other first years, what could be assumed to be the elderly witch's pet cat on the desk.

'There's something familiar about that cat…' he thought to himself. There was a commotion to his side, and he saw the tall, red haired boy named Roy Wesley, or something to that effect, burst into the room, breathing hard as he recovered from the fairly obvious run he was forced to perform to get to class.

"Heh, lucky me. She's not here yet!" he said, glad of his luck.

However, whatever hopes the boy had were quickly crushed as the cat leapt from her perch on the desk, and morphed into the very woman he had dreaded laying eyes on at that particular moment in time.

"I'm afraid that you have assumed incorrectly, Mr. Weasley," she said sternly. "Perhaps I could transfigure your books into a pocket-watch so that you could tell the time?"

The boy looked sheepish, setting his books down next to another Griffindor. "Sorry, I got lost." A staccato of laughs was his reply from his peers, and the teacher's lips pressed into a thin line.

"Very well then Mr. Weasley, I will not penalize you for your tardiness today. However, if you are late again I will need to take points," she told him. "Now, please sit down. There is much to tell you all."

McGonagall moved to the chalkboard, tapping her wand on the dark-green surface. White letters began to form, spelling 'Transfiguration.' She turned to the students, her eyes seeming to turn to stone as she looked at them with a stern glare.

"First of all, transfiguration is without a doubt one of the more dangerous magics you will be learning here at Hogwarts. I suggest that you do not commit any acts of tomfoolery or rule-breaking in this class if you plan on continuing to take it during your life as a student here.

"Now, for the first week or so you will be studying theory only. If you wish to practice outside of class, you may, but nothing more complicated than turning a match into a needle, or else points will be taken and detentions will be given. Do I make myself clear?"

The class responded with a nervous 'yes!'

She nodded, satisfied that they understood her. "Excellent. Now then, if you will open your books to page…"

And so the class did as they were told, reading into the mechanics of transfiguration so that they didn't blow anything up on there first attempt. Harry, having already read the material, opted to put his head down and catch some sleep…

This proved to be a useless venture though, as he was suddenly doused with water. He looked up, confused, and saw the professor looming over him with her eyebrows raised and her wand in hand.

"I'm so glad you could join us, Mr. Potter," she said, irritation creeping into her voice. "Tell me, what should you primary focus be while transfiguring an object?"

Harry blinked. "Visualizing the transformation from what it is to what you want it to be."

Professor McGonagall looked at him shrewdly, before applying a drying charm to his person and sighing. "That is correct, five points to Slytherin. Mr. Potter, I advise that despite already knowing the material, you do something constructive in this class. I don't want you lazing about on my watch."

With her point made, she walked off and continued to supervise the rest of the class. Harry heard a distinctive 'tch' sound not too far away, and saw Neville giving him a disapproving look. Harry shrugged and pulled out a dueling book.

The class continued to crawl by, and Harry could've sworn the clock on the wall was actually frozen before the bell finally rang, signaling the students to make there ways to their next class. Harry slipped his book into the bag and was the first to exit the room. He pulled out his schedule, and saw that he had Charms class next with the Ravenclaws.

"Hey, Potter!" said a voice. Harry looked over his shoulder, and saw that Neville (followed by Weasley, who held an awed visage, along with the Thomas boy and another kid Harry hadn't met) was walking towards him, a stern glare on his face. "What did you think you were doing, sleeping in class?"

Harry tilted his head. "I already knew the material, so I had no reason to read it." Neville sneered.

"Such arrogance. Repetition, Potter, is a powerful learning tool. I suggest you use it. " He stopped for a second, looking over Harry's attire. "I also think that I should bring to your attention that you should put on some respectable clothes." With that, he stalked away with the other three boys walking behind him. Just before he turned the corner, Harry smirked while flicking his wand. "WHAT TH-"

There was a crashing sound, and Harry saw that Neville had tripped; as his shoes had been transfigured into… banana peels.

Harry, a light smirk adorning his face, ignored the cries of outrage and laughter as he vacated the corridor.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

The bell rang, and Harry was once again sitting in the back of the classroom. However, this time the class was for the art of enchanting physical things to do that which they were not meant to do in accordance with the laws of nature, among other things. Charms, or as some of the more advanced spells were called, enchantments. The teacher, a tiny little old man, sat atop a pile of thick textbooks as he called roll. When he reached Longbottom's name, the man had fallen over in excitement.

Yes, this class would no doubt prove to be interesting.

After he had called roll, Professor Flitwick had asked the students to all pull out their wands.

"Now class, your books will be for homework only and for you to refer to when attempting a spell. I admire practical learning in this particular field of magic, so most of your time here will be spent actually performing spells," he said cheerfully. "Now, for your first wand-movement; Swish and flick!"

He preformed the motion, and the class reflected it.

"Very good, now please continue to practice that motion. I no it may seem ridiculous, but wand motions are very important for magic. One erroneous flick or wave of the wand could completely alter the spell you are trying to perform!" He flicked his wand, and feathers appeared on everyone's desks. "Now, once you're sure that you have the wand-movement memorized, just call on me and I'll tell you the incantation!"

The professor walked around the class room, correcting anyone who failed to correctly produce the wand movement, and giving out points to those who mastered it very quickly. Harry, in the back, amused himself by performing the very spell that Flitwick was in the process of teaching them.

The levitation charm… _wingardium leviosa_…

The first spell he had ever done. The spell that his mother had taught him.

"Mr. Potter!" said the professor. Harry looked over, a bored look on his face.

"Yes, professor?" he asked.

"Been reading ahead I see! Five points to Slytherin," said the man ecstatically. He skipped away, assisting other students in the same cheerfulness. Harry, finally bored with the class, let his books down and leaned back in his chair, putting his feet up on the desk. He glasses slipped down to the tip of his nose, and his eyelids slowly closed over his green eyes.

'Gotta find something to do…' he thought.

"How did you do that?" asked a timid voice. Harry looked over, and saw the girl he had met at the platform sitting not too far from him. The girl, easily a head shorter than he, was practicing the wand movement with a skilled grace. "The spell," she specified.

"The incantation is _Wingardium Leviosa_," he told her, biting back a yawn. Ironically enough, Professor Flitwick had told everyone the incantation just then. She muttered the spell, the quill in front of her hovered for a second, before falling back onto the table. She sulked, her face slightly pink.

"Ha, so the little mutt is having trouble with a spell?" said another girl. Harry, once again disturbed from his sleep, began watching a blonde Ravenclaw in the row below him ridicule the girl to his side. "Tch, they never should've let someone like _you_ into this school! It's an insult!"

The girl was about to retort, but she stopped before she could utter a sound. Averting her eyes, she said nothing and continued to sulk. The blonde girl just laughed and returned to her own feather, a smug look on her face appearing as her own feather skyrocketed into the air.

The other girl, for her part, adopted a hard look and continued to try and levitate her own feather.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Su Li (English convention), eleven year old Ravenclaw of half-blood witch of Chinese/Scottish ancestry, was not having a very good time at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Now, things _had _started off fairly well. After being dropped off at the Platform by her parents (who proved to be very busy people, as her mother worked at the International Magical Relations Department of the Ministry, and her father had a bookshop in London that was particular busy that day), she had managed to get on the train with little trouble.

However, upon finding a compartment, it came to her attention that her years at the school would have certain difficulties.

She had taken a seat and started reading a book that she had brought from home, but her compartment had been invaded by another girl. Normally, Su would have taken no mind to this and welcomed the other student. However, this newcomer had proved to be most… obnoxious.

Su was a small girl, much like her mother at her age, and was a head shorter than her peers. Normally this would not have bothered her, but her parents had decided to send her to primary school when she was young in hopes of her improving socially, as she had always been rather shy. Unfortunately, severe immaturity as well as fear of the exotic proved to lead to the other children teasing Su about her height (and some of the more brutal teased her about her lineage). Thus, the girl had become even more introverted and timid.

Now, when she had been sent to Hogwarts, she had high-hopes. She would be among children like herself, able to do magic. She would be able to make friends. However, those hopes were crushed when her parents warned her about the blood purity issue. Fortunately, they also told her only about twenty-five percent of the students would be something to worry about concerning that subject, and all she had to do was steer clear of them.

Now, back to the girl who had entered Su's compartment; she easily towered over Su, and her aristocratic features and the way she held herself implied that she came from a pureblood family. However, Miss Li was not one to judge and hadn't made any assumptions just yet. Unfortunately, this was not something that the two girls shared.

The girl stared down at Su, wrinkling her nose. "Who are you?" she demanded. Su swallowed.

"My name is Su Li," she said. The girl scoffed, backing away as if Su held some sort of contagious disease.

"I've never heard of _that_ family… I take it you're a mudblood," she said venomously. She looked over Su. "And a shrimpy one at that. How old are you, seven?"

Su, feeling a tad bolder, said, "No, I'm eleven. You have to be at least that to come to Hogwarts." The girl raised her brow.

"I suggest you watch your tongue, mudblood. I am Selene Grey, and I happen to be the heir to a very old pureblood family," Grey spat. Su was about to argue, but stopped as Grey stalked out of the compartment, sneering.

Now, normally such an unsavory encounter would vacate her mind and be of little concern. It wasn't like she was going to share a room with Grey…

Oh, how wrong she was.

Grey, despite her stereotypical Slytherin Tendencies, was sorted into Ravenclaw, and Su was sent into the house of the ravens as well, as luck would have it. Thus, Su was now condemned to listening to Grey rant about how superior she was and how Su was a mudblood and unworthy of studying magic. There other roommate, Padma Patil, did not interfere as she was rarely around anyway, opting to spend most of her time in the library or reading from the Ravenclaw Common Room's private stock of texts.

Such was the life of Su Li, being ridiculed for her height and lineage. With her self-confidence next to nothing, magic did not come as easily to her as it did to others.

_However, years from now… she would prove to be deadlier and more powerful than Grey could ever hope to be. _

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

It was Potions Class now, and Harry was, of course, sitting in the back. However, this time he was not sleeping. He knew much about this man… Professor Severus Snape. Harry knew that given his parentage, the Professor would no doubt bring him less-than-happy-tidings regardless of his behavior.

It wouldn't help either of them for the Professor to find Harry asleep in the middle of class, though, and only make things more troublesome. Besides, he could never sleep just after eating lunch.

The doors burst open, revealing a tall, pasty, greasy haired, hook-nosed man in black robes that billowed around him as he walked to his desk. It was Professor Severus Snape, Head of Slytherin House, in all his glory. Harry could've sworn he heard some of the girls around him sighing appreciatively…

Harry was pretty sure he just vomited into his mouth a little.

"In this class, you shall be learning the subtle and finesse needy field of Potion Making… I hold little doubt that you dunderheads are incapable of truly appreciating the art in this branch of magic." He paused, looking over the students before him. His obsidian eyes fell onto Neville Longbottom, and the man's face contorted into a sneer. "Longbottom, let us see if you have improved over the summer at all, as much as I doubt it.

"Tell me; what is the difference between monkshood and wolfs bane?" he snapped. Neville sighed and shrugged.

"I don't know, sir," he said his voice tight. Snape scowled, his sneer deepening.

"As I thought… you haven't even bothered looking into your books, have you?" he asked. Neville said nothing. "Very well, five points from Gryffindor."

Snape continued looking over the class, looking for his next victim. He instantly passed over the bulk of his Slytherins, and his gaze mainly concentrated on the Gryffindors. Eventually, his eyes lay on Hermione Granger, who had had her hand up for the past few minutes.

Exasperated, Snape asked, "Yes, Granger?"

Smiling, Hermione said, "There isn't a difference, and the substance is also known as aconite." Snape rolled his eyes, and the girl frowned.

"I hope you weren't expecting points for such a simply question, Granger," he said, sneering as she looked down and blushed while Longbottom and Weasley glared at her (albeit stealthy; While Neville didn't like loosing, he had an image to uphold. Ron, however, failed to show the finesse of his friend. "Know it all…").

Snape tapped his wand on the chalkboard, causing spidery writing to snake its way on and form a couple pages worth of notes. "This is an outline on the basics of potion making. It includes the types of ingredients, their effects, and how they work together. Have this written down by the end of class. I expect the lot of you to study it every night until you are able to recite this in your sleep."

The students, not wanting to provoke their Professor's wrath, instantly began taking down the notes. Professor Snape sat at his desk, going through papers that were no doubt summer homework papers from other students.

Harry began copying down the notes in his untidy, nearly illegible scrawl, despite already knowing the information by heart. Not copying the notes would mean attention. People knowing he already knew the information would get more attention. And attention was bad. Very, very bad.

'…I'm hungry…'

**_0o0o0o0o0o0_**

Hermione Granger was picking at her food. It was lunchtime on Halloween. School had been… a less than enjoyable time for her. Her reputation as a know-it-all had managed to follow her even into a completely different society, and she had become the object of ridicule within her own house. Okay, she had to admit that Neville wasn't so bad… but he just so condescending around her. It was infuriating! He thought that she couldn't take care of herself just because she was a muggleborn, that she needed his help whenever he saw her!

Then there was the Weasley boy, Ronald. He didn't have that condescending attitude like Neville… he was outright malicious in his behavior towards her, calling her an insufferable know-it-all and half of the things he told her were along the lines of 'go away,' and 'shut up!' The latter proved to be his favorite, especially when she tried to help him in class.

Then there was Harry Potter… she couldn't help but feel drawn to him. She felt a vibe that told her they were in a similar boat: They were both outcasts. This feeling was only amplified when he was sorted into Slytherin, even though she was aware that he was not a bigot and couldn't care less about blood. How did she know this?

He didn't sneer at her, despite her being a blatantly obvious muggleborn. He didn't join the jeering from Malfoy and his cronies. He was an outcast even among his own house-mates.

Over the past couple of months, she had tagged along with him after classes. He spent much time in the library, or out on the grounds or at the top of the towers. He was a true recluse, although he seemed to at least tolerate her presence. She had tried to strike up a conversation with im several times, however all she got out of him were one word replies and short phrases. She figured that due to his ridicule in Slytherin (Not that she knew for certain that he was made fun of, but it was a rational assumption), and perhaps in him primary school years, had caused him to lack the necessary social skills for a real conversation.

She too was faced with ridicule in Griffindor, mostly due to Neville's treatment of her and also Ron's, who proved to be a second-in-command of sorts. The constant comments of her being a know-it-all, nerd, etc, had left her on the bottom of the social ladder. She withstood the bulk of the teasing, but every now and again she couldn't help but hide away and cry it all out.

Hermione hated it… being teased. Being the pitiful bookworm... But what choice did she have? Sure, she supposed she could show Weasley and his friends what she was made of next time they pushed her over the edge, but… it was unthinkable! She couldn't possibly do that. She could get detention, or worse, expelled! It just wasn't worth it.

The bushy-haired first year gulped down the last of her pumpkin juice, as class would be starting in less than ten minutes. It was Halloween, so she supposed she could look forward to the sweets at dinner. That was one thing she could be cheerful about.

An hour or two later, as she was putting up her stuff in her dorm room, she overheard a certain… conversation… that was probably not for her to know of.

"…so, did you hear about Ron's prank?" whispered Lavender from the bottom of the staircase. Parvati giggled, and Hermione peaked around the corner of the door. Her two roommates were… not the most desirable company. At least, not to her they weren't. They were perfectly nice girls, but they were also susceptible to the 'herd-instinct,' and thus teased her.

"Yeah, they're going to hit her with water balloons just as she enters the Great Hall for the Halloween feast!" Parvati giggled. "That'll put her in her place… where does she get off, flaunting how much smarter than us she is? Lousy know-it-all…" Hermione scowled, and brushed past the two girls, leaving them with their jaws open and panicky. "Oh no… The boys will hate us now!"

Neither girl noticed the tears running down Hermione's face as she broke into a run, fleeing from the wing that was supposed to be her haven within the school.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Harry dug into his food ravenously. He had been practicing spells out on the grounds for hours now, from the end of classes for the day until two hours after the sun had set. He was exhausted, practicing curses, jinxes, hexes, and shields that would give a fourth year trouble. His spell library had tripled since he had come to Hogwarts, and he was exhausted at the end of almost every day.

Classes themselves were fairly easy, as he had practiced much of the first year curriculum while at Diagon Alley, not to mention the studying he did during his early years while at the Dursleys. However, some lessons proved somewhat challenging, Potions and History of Magic to be specific. Herbology wasn't necessarily hard but… it bored him, as did History of Magic. Potions he simply wasn't able to prepare for beyond studying, and History of Magic and Herbology were simply uninteresting.

Defense against the Dark Arts, which he thought would have been interesting, proved to be more of a joke class as opposed to a self defense class. The teacher, Professor Quirrel, spoke half of his words with a stutter and was scared by his own shadow. The man simply stank of fear.

Flying lessons had ended up being something of interest, however. Strangely, he found that he felt more 'at home' in the air than on the ground. The wind in his hair, the thrill of the dives, spins, and other maneuvers exhilarated him to a point he had never felt.

Harry Potter had found a second hobby (the first being combative magic): Flying.

A pity he had no broom of his own, and that the school brooms were only allowed to be used by Quidditch Players or for lessons… he would've normally ignored this, but the security wards on the broom-shed were far too complicated for him with his current skills.

Harry finished his dinner, and ended up showing that he did have _some_ table manners by using a napkin to clean his face. He looked up and observed the hall, taking note that most of the students were eating, talking or both… some of them doing it at the same time.

The cheery atmosphere was broken, however, as Professor Quirrel ran into the Great Hall, breathing hard.

"Troll!" he shouted in a way that would put a banshee to shame. "Troll, in the dungeon!"

The inhabitants of the hallway stared at him. Nobody moved an inch.

"Thought you ought to know." The man fainted, and as his body hit the ground, so did the shit to the fan.

The hall erupted in screams as the students unleashed a hellish cacophony, terrified by the news. Harry noticed Malfoy was screaming in one of the shrillest, highest voices he had ever heard. He was pretty sure that his glasses would've shattered if Dumbledore had not stood up and silenced the hall with a loud BANG from his wand.

"Students are to follow their prefects and take refuse in their houses. The staff and I shall take care of this. Please, go now," he said, his voice surprisingly powerful for one as old as he.

The students calmed down a little, and the prefects began leading them to their dorms… which, ironically, were _in the dungeons_, right where the troll was. Harry couldn't help but smirk. Despite Hogwarts' supposed non-favoritism (aside from Snape, but Harry really didn't care), the Slytherins tended to get the short end of the stick from time to time.

As the students fled into the dungeons to get to their dorm rooms, Harry stopped.

The stench… the smell… He looked to his side, and saw _it_; Twelve feet tall, patchy gray hide, and two tons of raw muscle and no brains. It was a mountain troll. It was several dozen meters down the corridor, dragging its club, but Harry saw it. He had smelt it.

And the troll had saw him as well… and smelt him. The troll roared, and charged wildly at Harry.

"…fuck."

The young boy spun on his heals and ran as fast as he could the opposite way. The troll, despite being slow for it's size, still managed to catch up with him. Harry vaulted into a classroom to avoid the blow of the club, and had his wand out just in case…

The scent of the troll became thinner. It was going to leave him be.

Harry stepped out… and froze. The troll was entering the girl's bathroom just across from the unused classroom.

Harry caught a glimpse of the behemoth as it entered the lavatory, and he felt his adrenaline spike. This was it… this was his chance to see how far he could go. Harry ran at the troll, and caught site of a terrified first year in the bathroom.

The troll brought up its club.

Hermione stared at it. She was pale, and couldn't utter a sound.

The troll grunted loudly, bringing the blunt instrument down on her eleven year old body.

"I'm going to die," whispered Hermione. She clamped her eyes shut, awaiting the imminent blow.

It never came.

Harry didn't know why he had done it… he could've just fired a curse at the troll's back. Instead, he had cast a severing curse on the club, and banished the amputated length of wood across the bathroom, saving Hermione from a gruesome fate that would've followed if the troll had been able to hit her.

The troll grunted in confusion, looking at its mutilated weapon. He roared, infuriated, and whirled around and saw Harry, his wand out. The troll snarled, and charged towards the lean boy, ready to bring the stump that was left of his club down on Harry's head.

Harry dashed to the side, dodging a blow, and sent a conjunctivitis curse into the behemoth's eyes. Blinded, the troll began swinging wildly. Harry managed to dodge any blows that came close to him, and start ripping the troll's outer layer of hide with a barrage of severing spells. After several strikes, thick blood began dripping onto the floor.

The troll howled, and swung its club horizontally in a surprising show of tactical intelligence. Harry could duck below it, and the remains of a bathroom stall stood behind him, so he tried to jump over the club.

He had no such luck, and the weapon slammed into him. HARD. Harry was sent flying into a wall, and he fell to the ground dizzy.

"Harry!" shouted Hermione. The troll turned around and grunted. He began to renew his assault on the girl, but a reducto hit him in the back of his head. Unfortunately, the magic didn't manage to get all the way through the thick bone, but Harry's attack certainly made the beast dizzy.

"C'mon," said Harry. Hermione felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle. His voice sounded… different. Wrong even. "C'mon, you sack of shit. Show me what you've got!"

Hermione gulped upon seeing his face. His glasses were cracked and askew on his face, with his hair sticking to his pale, sweaty skin and caked with blood. The grin on his face seemed to split his cheeks… but the smile didn't reach his eyes.

He looked more like a raging beast than a boy.

The troll turned around, roared, and charged.

Harry did a series of complicated wand movements, and fired a dark red curse at the troll. It impacted with the creature's chest, causing it to erupt in flames. The troll screeched in pain, and swung the club wildly at where the attack had come from. Harry ducked below the first strike, and dashed between the monster's legs.

Hermione winced, seeing that his left arm looked like it was dislocated. There was also a deep gash in his ribs, and blood soaked his robes. However, he still stood, and raised his wand once again.

"Want some more, mother fucker?" he hissed. He levitated several chunks of rubble into the air, and banished them at the troll. The troll was forced back against the wall with each strike, and Harry continued to advance on it. "What, giving up already?! YOU'VE GOT MORE THAN THAT IN YOU!"

"Harry…" whispered Hermione. "Please… stop. This isn't you! God… I hope this isn't you…"

The troll snorted, brushing off rubble that had embedded itself in its skin, and it chucked its club at Harry. The boy conjured a tongue of flames, incinerating the wooden instrument. Another jet of flame collided with the troll, burning its face to match its charred torso.

Now, both blinded and burnt, the troll roared in fury and broke into a run, ready to plow headlong into Harry. Hermione, knowing that she would also be caught in the collision, ran for the other side of the bathroom.

Harry smirked.

"This is the end for you," he murmured. He waved his wand and a crimson beam of light shot from the tip. Like a surgeon's scalpel, the beam of light cut into the troll's ankles, through the bone, and into the tendons. The troll whimpered in pain, and fell just before hitting Harry.

Had the troll taken one more step, he would've fallen on top of his opponent. Harry stared down at the mountain troll through his glasses, and spit some blood to the side.

"I won't leave you in pain any longer," he whispered. He fired the strongest reducto he could into the troll's skull, and the troll twitched once, and died.

"Y-you…" Hermione stuttered. "Y-you… you k-killed it…" On one hand, she was grateful. On the other… she was horrified. She knew that Harry was rather odd… but she had never expected this.

"Your point?" Hermione flinched. His voice… it wasn't his usual distracted tone. His voice was cold, harsh… "What is your point, Granger?"

"I… I…"

"WHAT IN THE BLOODY CIRCLES OF HELL HAPPENED HERE?" shouted a voice.

Harry and Hermione jerked their heads towards the door, and saw Professors McGonagall, Quirrel, Snape, and Dumbledore standing there. The Gryffindor head of house looked positively lived. Quirrel, catching site of the mutilated troll, excused himself and vomited into a nearby toilet. Snape looked at Harry in a calculating manner, while Dumbledore looked pensive.

"Would you care to tell us what happened here, Mr. Potter, Miss Granger?" he said, his eyes vacant of their usual twinkle.

Harry stayed silent, shrugging off his robe. Hermione, catching sight of his various injuries, winced.

"Good heavens, Potter," shouted McGonagall. "I'll go get Poppy."

"Don't bother," said Harry, as if there was nothing wrong at all. He cast a spell, and his body glowed with a blue light for a second. His arm snapped back into place, and his other wounds sealed up. He was still sore, and his wounds were still tender. A rather crude first attempt, but it got the job done. "I'm fine."

"Yes," said Snape sarcastically. "You run in like a bullheaded Gryffindor, take down a troll by the skin of your teeth, and you're _fine_." Snape was seething. One of his Slytherins was acting like a bloody, idiotic Gryffindor. "What's wrong Potter? Sick of Longbottom getting all the attention, thought you'd do something heroic yourself?"

"Now, now, Severus, let us not make assumptions," placated Dumbledore. He looked to Harry. "Tell me, did you kill this troll? And if so, why?"

Harry remained silent, working out the kinks in his newly mended arm. Hermione broke the silence.

"I was here in the bathroom when the troll came. Harry saved me," she blurted. Dumbledore raised his eyebrows.

"Why were you not at the feast, Miss Granger?" he asked. Hermione looked away crossing her arm over her chest and grasping the opposite bicep.

"I…" she started. "I heard that someone was going to prank me in the Great Hall, so I hid here."

Dumbledore nodded, filing away the information for future reference. The troll was a more serious matter, but Hermione's harassment would be dealt with. He turned to Harry. "Why did you not return to your dorms as you were told, Mr. Potter?"

Harry gave the headmaster a cool stare. "I was, but the scent of the troll stopped me… I didn't feel like vomiting in mid run, so I stopped to collect myself." Had this been a different situation, Hermione might have giggled a little bit. "I saw the troll, and it saw me. I ran and hid in a class room, and the troll then turned its attention to Granger. The troll, after killing Hermione, would have no doubt turned its attention and tried to kill me, so I decided to defend myself."

Dumbledore nodded. "You have a valid point, my boy, but did you necessarily have to go through the trouble of killing it? I see you hit it with a conjunctivitis curse. That should've bought you enough time for you and Miss Granger to flee."

Harry tilted his head, spitting some blood out of his mouth onto the floor. "The troll was still trying to kill me… so I killed it. I took a gamble and tested my strength. I was stronger, so I won."

Professor Snape sneered, looking at Harry incredulously. "You should have ran, Potter. What do you think would've happened if you hadn't gotten lucky?" he asked.

"Then, Professor," he responded, "I would have died." He said it as if he were discussing the weather.

With that, Harry left the bathroom, leaving four teachers and a first year staring at him, mouths agape.

Dumbledore frowned deeply.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"Uh… Harry?"

It was the next day after classes, and Harry was in the library, studying. Hermione stood before him nervously. The boy looked up, his glasses newly mended.

"Yes?"

"I… I wanted to thank you for saving me yesterday," she said. "A-and… I need to know." She looked at him warily, her eyes slightly teary. "Do… do you _want_ to die?"

Harry's speech last night had chilled her to the core. 'Then, Professor, I would've died…' He sounded so apathetic about it… like he didn't matter.

Harry stared at her, his eyebrow arched. It was probably one of the most articulate expressions she had ever seen on his lean, somewhat feminine face.

"No," he finally said after a long, awkward pause. "I do not want to die. And that is why I fight everyday, as hard as I can, to stay alive."

He gathered up his books, and slung his backpack over his shoulder.

"I have things to take care of on this Earth, Granger. I won't be dying anytime soon."

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Months passed. Harry, naturally, received detention for his actions, but he also was awarded points for his 'heroism.' Neville Longbottom became the new Seeker for the Gryffindor Quidditch team, and proved to be quite talented at the job. Harry continued to assimilate any information on the combative arts of magic in the library, even sneaking into the restricted section at night to do so.

He and Hermione had… well, he supposed you could say they had become 'friends,' but it was more of a tenuous acquaintanceship than a friendship. This had, unfortunately, had a detrimental effect on both of there social lives. The Slytherins had ridiculed Harry for befriending a mudblood, while Hermione was ostracized for befriending 'the enemy,' as Harry was a Slytherin and Neville's apparent nemesis, according to the Boy Who Lived.

At the end of the year, Neville, Ron, Seamus, and Dean had been caught up in a fiasco with the Philosopher's Stone. The magical stone had been hidden within Hogwarts to keep it out of Voldemort's clutches, but this would have proved futile if not for Neville and his Light Brigade's intervention.

This act of heroism had allowed the Lion's House to win the House Cup, in addition to the Quidditch Cup, by a landslide. It also proved to inflate Ron's head several notches and Neville was revered as a hero even more so than before. Dean and Seamus had even gained a reputation as heroes in Gryffindor, but they had at least had the grace to be humble about it… at least, more humble than there red-haired cohort.

It was the night before the last day of school, and Harry was sitting on the edge of one of the towers of Hogwarts, looking up at the night sky.

"It is magnificent, is it not?" said an old, but strong voice. Harry didn't move and continued observing the dark heavens.

"Hello, Professor," said Harry. "May I help you?" Harry leaned backwards, now staring at Dumbledore… upside down.

Unperturbed, Dumbledore laughed genially. "Ah, Mr. Potter, it is I who wishes to help you." He looked at Harry, his smile fading. "I would at first like to apologize. I knew your family well, and I was never there to talk to you about what had happened.

"You… wish for vengeance on Voldemort, yes?"

Harry didn't flinch, but tilted his head to the side. He said nothing. Dumbledore sighed, conjuring a stool and sitting down on it.

"I know you are a sharp boy, so I hold no doubts that you are aware of young Neville's true relationship with Voldemort?" The man looked over his half-moon spectacles. Harry remained silent. Frowning, Dumbledore continued. "I have a proposition for you. I can offer you guidance, Mr. Potter, just as I did with Neville. I can help you to grow strong. You can help us, and Neville will ultimately defeat Voldemort."

Harry narrowed his eyes, considering. He sat up again, and turned around on the stone block he was sitting on.

"I… accept help, from you?" he asked. Dumbledore nodded. Harry frowned, considering.

After a long, awkward silence, he smirked. Dumbledore's eyes twinkled.

"No."

Dumbledore's twinkle died.

"Why?"

Harry's smirk deepened, seeming to cut his cheek in two. "My mother told me to _grow_ strong, Dumbledore. Not wag my tail and beg for it from some old man." Dumbledore was affronted by the disrespect, and stood. Harry did so as well. "I'll grow by my own strength, Dumbledore… I won't sell my soul to you like Neville did."

With that, Harry left for his dorms. Dumbledore scowled, his twinkle replaced with an angry flame.

'Does he know…? No. Impossible.'

Dumbledore gulped. His superiors would no doubt be angered if the Potter boy interfered with the scenario…

He'd have to play things carefully from here on in. Harry James Potter was a variable, and a dangerous one indeed.

AN: Yo.

Just to clear some things up… I know that the classes and first-year events didn't happen as they did in cannon, but I honestly don't feel like just regurgitating what JK Rowling wrote. Before you ask, yes, Su Li will play a role in the future. Besides Tak's fic 'Doing it All Over Again,' I haven't seen her in any fanfiction, so I thought I'd give it a shot.

And no, this will not be Harry/Hermione. Hell, I might not even do any pairings whatsoever. We'll just have to see what happens, eh?


	7. Summer and a Bit of Nostalgia

AN: I have received numerous complaints about my anime-like expressions such as the sweat-dropping and face vaulting. It's really not a big deal, so I'll cut down on it a little bit if you guys are really that bothered by it. Also, just to clarify: HARRY WAS NOT INFLUENCED BY NARA SKIKAMARU IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER. I can see where people might get that, but I just want everybody reading this to get it straight. This version of Harry is modeled primarily after Hotaru of the Four Emperors from Samurai Deeper Kyo, with a bit of other characters mixed in.

And since I have no other way to communicate with you, Lisa, here's my response to you review:

Concerning Harry wearing sandals: I am well aware of the fact that wearing sandals in a Scottish Autumn is quite silly. I was emphasizing Harry's odd personality. He wasn't too bothered by the chilly weather. Now, when winter rolled around… well, I think that much will be explained with this chapter.

As for the comments about Knockturn Alley, I think either I failed to clearly convey my message or you misread what I wrote (Or I misread what you wrote in your review). Harry had concluded that Knockturn Alley was NOT purely Dark Arts and whatnot, and that its reputation was ludicrous. I wasn't saying that the Ministry was stupid for letting it be, I was just saying that people were stupid for assuming that it was entirely dark.

If you have any rebuttals to that, I'll welcome them fully. Sometimes I can be oblivious to the obvious.

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

**_Chapter Seven: Summer and a Bit of Nostalgia_**

Far away looking green eyes stared down at the tiny pebble which lay upon the hardwood floor. The room was painted an off-white color, and lacking of all but the essentials; a bed, dresser, desk, and lamp. A trunk sat in the corner, the lid agape, revealing numerous spell books and robes. Harry had returned to the Dursleys not more than four hours ago, and after being on the receiving end of one of his uncle's rants, was sent to his room.

Harry gripped his wand tightly, weighing his options. If he made the ward stone regain its original stature, he would be able to perform magic outside of school as long as it was done within his room. However, the act of unshrinking it might cause him to be expelled. In the end, he reasoned that he would get off with a warning.

Raising his wand, the boy waved it and intoned, "_Finite Incantatem_." There was a popping sound, as the magics keeping the stone a fraction of its true size were undone, and the massive slab of rock snapped back into position. The floor creaked slightly, and Harry hastily reinforced the floorboards with a spell just as an owl collided with his head.

Blinking, Harry looked down at the avian creature that was laying on the floor, its extremities askew and a letter beside it. Harry picked up the letter, ignoring the distressed bird on his floor, and began reading.

_Dear Mr. Potter,_

_Intelligence has detected the use of a spell-canceling spell being performed in your residence. _

_As per the Restriction of Under Aged Sorcerery, you have now received an official warning from the ministry. If you perform any more magic during this summer, you will be suspended, fined, or expelled from Hogwarts, depending on the severity of your crime._

_Enjoy your holidays!_

_Mafalda Hopkirk_

Improper Use of Magic Office

_Ministry of Magic_

The owl flew away, breezing past Harry's face as it exited the room via his window. Smirking, Harry tossed the letter up in the air and set it aflame with a flick of his wand.

'Oh, this summer is going to be _fun_.'

"BOY!" Harry turned around as his uncle pounded on the door with his fist, before opening it. Vernon Dursley was a large man, and was quite muscular beneath the fat that most people saw. His mustache bristled in an irritated manner, and he glared at Harry shrewdly. "Now that your back from that… _freakish_ place, we'll need to set down some new ground-rules."

Harry tilted his head, saying nothing.

"Firstly, you are not to perform any of your nonsense in front of me, my family, or the neighbors. For all intents and purposes, you are not to exist underneath this roof. Am I understood, boy?" Harry nodded, and Vernon's face turned to a lighter shade of red as he calmed down somewhat. "I take it you want something in exchange, boy?"

Harry adopted a far-off look on his face, lost in thought. He blinked, and his green irises refocused on his uncle. "Since I don't exist in this house… you can do your own chores." Vernon's face began to darken, but Harry held up a hand. "Worry not, dear uncle," he said, his voice dripping with barely audible sarcasm. "I won't eat from your table. I shall provide for myself, and that is all. I will, as you said, not exist beneath this roof for all intents and purposes."

The stared each other down, chilling green boring into earthy brown. Their breathing was steady, but any observer could tell it was a silent battle of wills. Despite Vernon's thuggish visage, he was an intelligent man. The boy was unnerving before, but now that he had God knew what kind of magics under his belt…

In the end, it was best said that the boy was not someone to be messed with.

With a huff, the man stepped out of Harry's room and went down the stairs to continue on with is previous business, leaving his nephew alone.

Now that his uncle was gone, Harry closed and locked the door, securing it additionally with a spell. He turned around, sitting on his bed. The young wizard had a whole summer to practice magic with no outside interference. He still had quite a few books to read from his collection, so he supposed the best place to start was with that.

Curious, Harry summoned the strange book from his trunk. He had still not found a way to open it. He contemplated the mysterious tome, flipping it in his hands. Harry then recalled Mr. Burke's mysterious disappearance. The boy had sensed something that day… did it have something to do with the book? Harry shook his head. It would do no good to think about it now; he had no more information. He decided that he'd investigate the shop next time he made a stop in Diagon Alley. Until then, he'd just have to study from the books he _could_ open.

Snatching _Blood Curdling Curses and Horrifying Hexes_ from his trunk, Harry conjured a target at the far end of his room. It was time to get to work.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"Hey, Potter!"

Harry turned around. He was currently in the park and sitting on one of the few serviceable swings. Over by the gate, he saw the hulking form of a blonde boy bearing resemblance to his uncle. The boy sauntered over with his gang in tow.

"Drayton? My, how you've grown!" said Harry. He froze, giving Harry an utterly confused and incredulous look.

"You moron, I'm Dudley, your cousin! Drayton is that shrimpy kid over there!" Harry followed his self-proclaimed cousin's finger towards a small blonde boy that was playing at the other side of the park. Harry looked back at his cousin, squinting.

"Oh… ok." Harry blinked. "What's up?"

Dudley walked over to his cousin, staring him square in the eye. Harry stood, his own green eyes narrowing. A sneer formed on the larger boy's piggish face, and he began cracking his knuckles. His lackeys grinned in anticipation.

"I don't know what you've been up to at the pansy school of yours, but I think it's time I let you know who rules these streets," hissed Dudley. Harry was suddenly felt like he was in a really bad action movie…

Dudley pulled his fat fist back, preparing to clock Harry in the face. With a grunt, Dudley threw his fist at Harry's face, who stepped to the side and avoided it. Dudley's strikes weren't nearly as dangerous as the troll's from last year, and Harry avoided them with ease. Practice in the 'weird-room' at Hogwarts had also helped.

The year before, Harry had been running about the castle and exploring. He couldn't sleep that night, and had been curious about the ancient stone fortress… that was also the night that he had learned that he needed to buy a pair of shoes. Getting frostbite on his toes and having Madame Pomphrey remove it had not been a fun ordeal.

Anyway, he had overheard several ghosts talking about a 'Room of Requirement.' Intrigued, the boy had pounced on an unfortunate House Elf in the middle of the night, hog-tied him, and asked the poor little creature where the could find the Room of Requirement. From what he could discern from the childish, broken speech the Room was located opposite of the tapestry with Barnabas the Barmy and the trolls, and would only be visible when needed. What was within depended on what the person walking outside of it desired.

After freeing the house-elf (and giving it a cookie for its troubles, upon which he had to endure a multitude of 'thank you' and 'you are so kind!'), Harry fled for the room… it was just what he needed.

To make a long story short, Harry had used to room for additional training in his spells. The room had provided him with targets to fire spells at, golems for a bit more realistic combat, and water-balloon shooting machines so that he could learn to dodge more effectively. Consequently, he had become prone to catching colds as well as a bit of frost-bite.

Harry once again dodged his cousin's strike, and the boy huffed in annoyance.

"Stand still, bastard!" he growled. Harry decided to the 'fight' right there, and decked his cousin in the face. The large boy fell to the ground, whimpering and nursing his bruised face. "Get him, boys!" he shouted.

Harry sighed. He just wanted to have a nice day at the park, you know, get some fresh air. But noooooooooooooooo… his idiotic, insecure cousin had to try and assert his superiority and try to beat him up. And then, when he failed to do so, he had to send his lackeys in to do it for him.

Harry ducked underneath another punch, and swept his leg across and tripped over the other boy. Harry snatched another's fist, and smashed his skull into the boy's face while bring his heel up into another boy's groin. Two down…

Dudley was angered that his lackeys were having trouble with his shrimpy cousin, and so pulled himself up and had clamped his meaty hands over his cousin's slim arms, holding them behind his back.

Harry twisted, trying to free himself, and kicked hi heel into his cousin's shin. Dudley cried out in pain, and Harry managed to slip out of his grasp. He pushed Dudley into a swing, in which Dudley's fat bottom managed to get fairly snug and stuck.

With his cousin at least temporarily taken care of, Harry turned his attention to the other boys. He ducked under a poorly aimed punch, through himself into the boy's gut, and drove him into the ground. Another boy tried to body-slam him, but Harry rolled out of the way just in time for the boy to hit his comrade.

At this point, Dudley had freed himself from his predicament and managed to get Harry into a headlock. Harry drove his heel into his cousin's shin again, but Dudley managed to keep hold. One of the boys brought himself back up and punched Harry in the face. Glass shattered, and Harry felt his skin get cut around his eye. Dudley tightened his hold, and two other boys grabbed his arms.

"WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?" Instantly, the boys all froze and looked to the gate at the edge of the park. There stood a young woman, perhaps in her early to mid twenties, with brown hair and glasses over blue eyes. She was wearing a tank-top and shorts soaked with sweat. Obviously, she had been jogging.

Wait, back up. Sweat, shorts, and tank-top… twelve year old boys just getting assaulted by the wonders of puberty… female…

"Hello, Ms. Karen," said Harry casually while the other boys gawked at her… ahem… assets.

"Good lord, what happened to your face?" said the Primary School teacher in worry. "Boys, you get off of him!" The boys, now comparable to sheep, did as they were told and the woman briskly ran over to Harry. She grasped his chin, looking closer at his face. "Just scratches," she muttered. She removed his glasses, carefully brushing off the glass from his face. "Do you feel any pain?"

"Nothing worth noting," said Harry. He had long ago learned to not resist Ms. Karen when she had a firm grip on you. Her hands were like steel pincers when she needed them to be. She narrowed her eyes, studying him.

"I'll get you some Neosporin at my house and we'll get you patched up," she said. She turned, glaring at Dudley and his gang. "As for _you_…" she said menacingly. They cringed at her tone, and some of them even shook. "…oh, just go back to your houses! If I catch you attacking Harry again, I'll be sure to get the cops on you! Now go!"

They all complied, running out of the park in fear, but not before giving a final glare at Harry. Ms. Karen turned back to the wild haired boy, looking at him shrewdly. "Come on, my house is just around the corner here."

Harry followed her, as she had already clamped her iron hand of death on his wrist. As they walked down the sidewalk, neither spoke.

"So," she said suddenly. "How is that new school of yours?" She looked at the boy.

Harry shrugged. "It's alright."

"Oh?" asked Ms. Karen. "Not great? Not bad?" Harry shrugged. She snickered. "I see you haven't changed; still as passive and indifferent as ever. Oh, we're here." They stopped before a house. It stood out quite a bit, painted a bright red as opposed to the off-white of the other houses.

Ms. Karen dragged Harry up the steps, pulling her keys out of her pocket. The key slid into the doorknob with a satisfying 'click,' and she opened the door. Harry felt a refreshing blast of cool air. She led him into the house, and finally let go of his hand in the kitchen.

"Just stay there, I'll be right back," she called back, disappearing behind a corner.

Harry looked around the kitchen. Like Ms. Karen herself, it was warm and welcoming in appearance. Warm browns, reds, and off whites decorated the walls and furniture, and a clock hung on the wall with the humorous visage of a black-cat, swinging its tail like a pendulum. There was also an empty birdcage in the living room, which he could see over the counter of the kitchen.

Just then, his host returned with a tube of Neosporin.

"Take off your glasses, Harry," she said, squeezing some of the healing substance onto her index finger. Harry did as instructed, and she grasped his jaw with her left hand while applying the Neosporin to the cuts on his face. "You're lucky none of the glass got in deep. It was just a few scratches." She looked over him again, to see if she missed anything.

"…thanks," said Harry, somewhat disconcerted by the woman's kindness. Sure, she had been nicer to him than the others at school, but it was a distant kindness.

"Your welcome, honey," she said with a wink. "Now why don't you sit down while I get us some soda and cookies, eh? I'm itching to know what you've been doing for the past year!"

And so the young boy told her an, albeit heavily edited, summarization of what had happened at Hogwarts. The troll had instead been a school bully who had gotten expelled, and Neville was simply a rich snob as opposed to a 'hero,' although Harry supposed both terms were appropriate for the boy. When asked about classes, Harry simply shrugged and told her they were similar to the primary school courses, although more advanced to fit his age.

She listened with rapt attention, asking the occasional question in an attempt to weasel out a bit more information from him. Harry, not wanting more trouble from the ministry _or_ from his teacher who could turn from Mother Theresa to demon in a flash, told her what he could.

"Did you make any friends?" she asked, sipping on her soda.

Harry shrugged dispassionately. "Sort of," he said, "I guess… there's this one girl."

"Oooh, you've got yourself a little girlfriend, eh?" teased Ms. Karen. Harry blinked, but did not blush in the least. If anything, he looked confused.

"Girlfriend…? What's significant about a friend being female?" asked Harry quizzically.

Ms. Karen stared at him, her glass still touching her lips. Her lips twitched a little, and she giggled. "Never mind, Harry, go on," she said, grinning.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"Oh, look at the time!" said Ms. Karen in worry, looking at the clock. Harry looked out the window, and saw that the sky had adopted an orange hue as the sun began to set. "I'm sure your family must be worried about you."

"Yeah," said Harry. "I should head home. Thanks… again."

"No problem, Harry," responded Ms. Karen while waving him off. "Really, you're welcome anytime. I need _something_ to do during the summer. Oh, and be sure that your family gets you some new glasses!"

Harry left, bandages over the left part of his face and only one lens in his glasses. It wasn't very long of a walk from Ms. Karen's home to his relative's, he had never truly thought of them as his family, home. He walked in unceremoniously just as the two pigs and the giraffe were sitting down for dinner. They pointedly ignored him, while Harry seemed oblivious to their presence. He silently climbed up the stairs, his hand fingering the wand in his pocket as he went over the food-conjuring spell he had memorized weeks earlier.

He was, however, confused to find the numerous locks and whatnot that now adorned his door. There was a sticky note attached to the door.

_As far as any of our guests are concerned, you either:_

_A: Don't exist or_

_B: Are deeply disturbed and upset by strangers. _

_Happy summer!_

Harry, managing to catch the sarcasm, crumpled up the sticky note and entered his room, and set the note aflame. He sat on his bed, and began performing the conjuration spell.

'I think I'll just have some meat-loaf tonight,' he thought. With a push of his wand, the meal instantly appeared before him.

Unfortunately, it hadn't occurred to Harry to conjure a plat and tray as well.

FLOP!

"…neh."

Harry ate the meatloaf, despite it being on the floor for a second or two. After all, he was a believer in the oh-so-wonderful 'five-second rule.'

**_0o0o0o0o0o0_**

Harry stood alone in the rain, waiting for a bus to come by. This was probably not one of his smarter decisions, as it seems he had come down with something as of late. He was very tired now, and sleeping a lot more than he usually did (which was a lot by itself). His appetite had also diminished a little bit, but that hardly put a dent in what he usually ate anyway.

It had been a particularly humid summer, and so the rain had been quite frequent for the past few weeks. School would be back in session in less than a month, and Harry had just recently received his letter from Hogwarts just last night. He had initially planned on his Uncle driving him into London, but he had not considered the specifics of their agreement…

Harry didn't exist.

Vernon Dursley didn't give rides to nonexistent people.

That, and Harry had slept in and been too late to ask the large man anyway…

Having no other options, the raven haired wizard had opted to wait at the local bus stop. He was dressed in his usual attire, jeans, a t-shirt, and sandals. His trunk had been shrunk and in his back-pocket. He figured he'd just catch a ride on the bus with the first years to get to Kings Cross. If anybody gave him crap about it, he could just hide in the cargo or disguise himself.

"Where's the bus?" he asked nobody in particular.

"About three hours away," said a voice. Harry shook his head, and lazily wiped the moisture off of his glasses, which had been fixed several weeks ago. After regaining the benefit of sight, he saw that Ms. Karen was in her car, her window rolled down. "What the hell are you doing out here, anyway?" she asked incredulously. "Good god, you're drenched! Get in here!" She unlocked the passenger door, and Harry climbed in without argument. "Does the word 'umbrella' mean anything to you?"

"Huh?" asked Harry. "Were you saying something?"

Rolling her eyes, Ms. Karen reached into the back and pulled out a towel. She tossed it at him. "Where were you going to go?" she asked. Harry, after wiping his face, looked at her.

"London… I need to get my school supplies," he said. Ms. Karen smirked.

"Ah, I have some business there myself! Want a ride?" she asked.

"Do I have a choice?" asked Harry.

"No." Smiling, Ms. Karen hit the gas and started heading for London. "So, any particular reason you've been so scarce this summer?" she asked. She glanced at him.

"I've been studying," answered Harry. "Summer homework."

"Huh, so _now_ you do your homework?" she said shrewdly. "If I remember correctly, you barely scraped by my class with a C because you didn't turn in those worksheets."

"Oh, we were supposed to turn those in?" asked Harry, truly confused. Ms. Karen gave a nervous laugh, her eye twitching slightly. "I thought we just had to fill them out…"

"Well, Harry, how was I supposed to know you did them if you didn't turn them in?" she countered. Harry remained silent contemplating.

"Oh… okay then," he finally said. Ms. Karen sighed.

"Sometimes I wonder exactly how you even passed my class at all," she said aloud. She tilted her head. "What did you get on your IQ test anyway?"

"Huh? Oh, the score wa-(VROOM!)" A car suddenly appeared in front of them, sliding into their lane without warning.

"Holy shit!" shouted Ms. Karen. She honked her horn loudly while rolling down the window. "WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOING, JACKASS!" she shouted out the window. The car sped off. Rolling back up her window, Ms. Karen huffed. "Jeez, people can be idiots… Harry, when you get your license, don't you _dare_ do what he just did! Always use your signal."

"Got it," said Harry.

The two of them were silent for a time. Ms. Karen concentrated on driving, as the rain had become even more intense, and her windshield wipers were having trouble allowing her to see through the windshield. Harry had finally gotten dry, through use of the towel and the air conditioner. While Ms. Karen concentrated on driving, Harry pondered his situation.

He felt weird. Ms. Karen was being… what was the word… nice? Yeah, she was being nice to him. Not just teacher nice, but buddy nice. Harry didn't think that the two of them had really ever been this close. Sure, she picked on him a lot in class back in the day, but that was usually because he was sleeping in class or didn't turn in his homework. The woman had also taken him to the nurse's office a lot as well, whenever he had gotten in a scuffle with Dudley. The larger boy had also been taken in, but Ms. Karen seemed to pay more attention to Harry.

During recess, when she wasn't grading papers, Ms. Karen would often sit down with him and try to get him to open up. This had failed, however, and her attempts soon fell in frequency. However, she had never completely stopped trying.

They were at a stop-light, and Harry noticed the woman he was currently pondering was looking at him.

"You're probably wondering why I'm being so nice to you," she said quietly. Harry looked at her, his head tilted to the side. She sighed, slouching in her seat. The traffic was horrible. "To be honest, you remind me a lot of myself at your age."

Harry raised an eyebrow. "Were you a boy like me?"

WHAM!

"No, you idiot," growled Ms. Karen. "I was quiet, withdrawn, a bit on the lazy side, and the class freak." Harry nodded, rubbing his head where the woman had hit him. Her face softened. "I had lost my parents too… you're in the same boat, no?"

Harry nodded.

"Frankly, I felt like a stray cat… I was just living life, going through the motions. I was distant and aloof, but as sharp as a tack if I do say so myself. My foster parents were alright, but I'd never call the house 'home,' per se," she continued. "Jeez, this traffic sucks…

"And then I became a teacher, and next thing I know you pop into my class with that distant look in your eye and no parents to speak of, if Open House was any indication," she went on.

Harry had to fight down a smirk. Yes, he remembered that day rather vividly…

_0o0-Flash-Back-0o0_

"_So, Dudders, this is your class?" asked Vernon to his son. The piggish child nodded, his two chins bouncing. His father looked around the room, his eyes narrow. _

_Meanwhile, Harry stood off to the side. His relatives hadn't wanted him alone in the house, so they had dragged him along. He really didn't have anything else to do, so he had not argued. He looked over at the walls, which were covered in various posters that were made up of drawings and notes about the artist's likes and dislikes. _

"_Dad, mine's over here!" shouted Dudley, dragging his parents to his own poster. On it was a very crude drawing of what was either a beach-ball or Dudley, underneath which were his likes and dislikes._

_Likes: Food, beeting up freeks, playing football, beeting up shrimps, candy… _

_Yeah, it kind of just kept going on like that._

_Dislikes: Freeks (especially Poter), homework, detenton, skool, when people dont lissen two me, and Poter. _

"_That's my boy!" said Vernon proudly, ruffling his son's hair. "Tell 'm what you want and what you don't want, and beat up the weirdoes who don't fit in with us upstanding individuals." Here, the man glared at Harry, who was currently more interested in the ceiling than anything else._

"_Hello, you must be Harry and Dudley's family!" said Ms. Karen, arriving on the scene after finishing conversation with another family. Vernon shook her hand, although he seemed somewhat disconcerted at being associated with Harry. "Your boys have been a delight in class," she continued. _

_Anyone with half a brain could tell she was partially lying, but fortunately for her Vernon was too blinded by his pride for his son to notice. _

"_Yes, Dudley is quite the gentlemen," said Petunia affectionately, running her fingers through her son's blond hair. Dudley tried to jerk away, but Petunia kept a grip on his scalp. "Harry hasn't been bothering you too much, has he?" asked Petunia seriously. _

_Ms. Karen laughed in her voice gentle. "No, he's been a good boy, if a bit on the sleepy side," she said. _

"_And Dudley?" asked Petunia._

_At this point, Ms. Karen's smile seemed to be a bit forced. "He definitely makes the class, ah… interesting," she said. "He's rather rowdy during recess, but no major trouble."_

_Vernon laughed deeply, patting his son on his porky shoulder. "Boys will be boys," he said. "I was quite the same way at his age. It's good for him, though. He knows how to show the others who's in charge!"_

"_Yes… heh," said Ms. Karen. She looked around. "Oh, there you are Harry! Come on over here, and show your family your poster!" _

_Harry shrugged, walking over and pointing at his own poster._

_The drawing was actually rather good, especially for a ten year old. It depicted Harry doing what he did best; sleeping. The boy was sitting on his desk, a trial of drool going down his mouth, and Ms. Karen standing menacingly above him. The woman couldn't help but giggle at the site of it, but the Dursleys were not so impressed._

_Likes: Sleeping, reading… and other stuff…_

_Dislikes: Lots of stuff…_

"_Yeah, Harry's a bit of the mystery man in the class," said Ms. Karen. _

_Hearing enough of his nephew, Vernon quickly switched topics to Dudley's own exploits, and Ms. Karen did her best to try and appear interested…_

_0o0-Flash-Back-0o0_

"You have no idea how hard it was not to tell your uncle that I didn't care about how much Dudley could eat as a baby," said Ms. Karen, failing to fight down a snort. Harry also couldn't help but smirk. "I don't suppose they've gotten any better?" she asked.

Harry yawned, his tiredness starting to creep up on him again. "We're pretty much ignoring each other right now," said Harry. He blinked, trying to get the sleepiness out. He yawned again.

"It'll take us a while to get to London, Harry," said Ms. Karen. "I'll wake you up when we get there, don't worry about it."

Harry shook his head, but soon succumbed to another yawn. He slouched in his seat, and rested his head on… something. It was warm. Momentarily, the twelve year old was snoozing like a baby.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Ms. Karen smiled as Harry involuntarily snuggled against her shoulder, and his breathing slowed down to the even in and out of sleep. She spread her arm over his shoulders, holding him still as she made a turn.

"Sweet dreams, kiddo," she said, smiling.

AN: Yep, yet another girl in Harry's life. Jeez, he's got Hermione already, and Su is on the way to being one of his 'friends.' Quite the ladies man… little bastard. And no, Ms. Karen is NOT a potential love interest. Pervs…

I would like to thank A-man for pointing out the illogicality of Harry training with weights, as he hasn't quite grown enough to do it safely. Thanks man.


	8. Seeing Red and the Woman in White

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Eight: Seeing Red and the Woman in White**_

"_Hello, Mr. Potter!" he shouted._

_Harry blinked, looking at the bizarre being that stood before him. It was head and shoulders below himself, but its girth easily outdid his own. His body was round, but filled with uniformed indentations. Stretching across its face was a large mouth, above which were two large eyes that seemed to shine with… something._

_It was a talking waffle. _

"_Hello," said Harry, as if nothing were out of the ordinary. The talking waffle squealed with glee. _

"_Finally, I've been trying to contact you for some times now, but I've been experiencing some interference," said the waffle. "Anyway, you're probably wondering who I am."_

"…_can I eat you? I'm hungry," said Harry. The waffle laughed nervously, shaking his head to indicate the negative. _

"_No, I'm you're guiding spirit!" shouted the waffle. "You must listen to me; I need to tell you something of great importance! If I do not, all that you have worked for will be for nothing!"_

"…_okay," said Harry. "What is it?"_

_The waffle paused, seeming to be trying to choose his words carefully. "Go there… the place where you found that which eludes yo—" He was interrupted by Harry's fist._

"_Just give me a straight answer," said Harry, flexing his hand. The waffle whimpered a little, rubbing his face with his comically gloved hands. _

"_Okay, okay," he said. "Jeez, can't take a little bit of theatrics_

"_Anyway, check out Borgan and Burke's when you get to the Alley. You should be able to find some answers there, specifically concerning the book," said the waffle. "Also, there's just some neat stuff. The Ministry picked the top floor clean but…" At this, the waffle simply winked._

"_Okay," said Harry. He stared at the waffle._

_His guiding spirit stared back._

_Harry leaned forward and the waffle's eyes widened. "What are you—NOOOOOO!"_

"Harry, wake up!" shouted a voice. Harry jerked away, and looked up to see a very disgruntled Ms. Karen. "You bit me!"

"Oh…" said Harry, retreating back to his seat. He looked at his ex-teacher, and saw that she was rubbing a small bite mark on her shoulder. "Sorry, I was dreaming."

"About what?" asked Ms. Karen, as she calmed down. The rain had gotten worse, and Harry could barely see through the wind shield of the car.

"He said he was my guiding spirit… he was a talking waffle," answered Harry. "Then I got hungry and ate him."

"Yeah… I got that," said Ms. Karen as she rubbed her shoulder. "Wait, what?" she asked with an eyebrow raised. Harry was about to speak again, but she waved him off. "You know what, I don't want to know." She reached behind the seat, and tossed a McDonald's bag at him. "No wonder you're hungry though, you didn't even eat lunch, did you?" Harry opened the bag, and found a half-eaten box of French fries and a burger inside. "Sorry… I kinda stole most of your fries."

"…thanks," said Harry. Tentatively, he pulled out the burger and scrutinized it. Shrugging, he took a bite and began eating. "How long was I out, Ms. Karen?" asked Harry, rubbing crust out of his eyes. Ms. Karen checked the clock in the dashboard.

"Not too long," she told him. "And c'mon Harry, you can just call me Karen; That 'Ms' stuff makes me feel old."

Harry gave a grunt, which 'Karen' took as a yes, and looked out the window. They had entered London, finally, and there were many people walking about with raincoats and umbrellas overhead to keep them in something similar to the state of dryness, although this proved to be a difficult task in the current state of the weather. Through the moisture, Harry barely made out the Leaky Cauldron not too far ahead of them. Harry wolfed down the last of his fries and burger.

"Stop here," he said. "Please," he added, seeing Karen's light glare reflected in the window. He could've sworn they turned red for a moment.

"You sure?" she asked. "It's raining cats and dogs out there; do you want an umbrella or something?"

"I'll be fine," he reassured her. "My destination is just ahead." Karen pulled into the curb, flicking a switch to unlock Harry's door. Harry grasped the handle, and looked over at the woman. "Thank you for the ride," he said.

"No problem, Harry," she said smiling. She reached over and held his shoulder. "Do you want a ride back home?"

Harry shook his head. "I'll be staying at a hotel until school starts." Karen bit her lip, but shrugged in resignation.

"You take care of yourself, alright? And don't forget to write!"

"Whatever," said Harry. She scowled a little, and rustled up his hair. "I will," Harry amended, as she was being less than gentle with his twelve year old scalp.

"That's what I thought you said," she said sweetly. She leaned over and kissed his cheek. "Bye."

Harry gave a grunt and vacated the car, and then made his way into the Leaky Cauldron, disappearing into the thick downpour of precipitation. Rubbing his glasses clean, Harry managed to discern the magical bar and inn through the rain and quickly opened the door and went inside, immediately met with the odors of food, drink, and smoke. His attention was drawn to Tom from the bar as he dried Harry with a flick of his wand.

"Welcome back, Mr. Potter!" said the man genially, walking over. "I suppose you'll be getting a room ready for the remainder of your stay?" he asked. Harry nodded, cleaning out his ear with his pinky finger. "I'll let you pay later, given the current state of the weather," said Tom, pointing out the window. "You can go and get yourself some money once it lets up."

Tom presented the boy with a key, adorned with a tag that said 'Room 7' in gold letters. Taking it, the young wizard gave a nod of thanks and then casually ascended up the stairs and into his room. Upon finding his designated quarters for the remainder of the summer, Harry entered it and immediately resized his trunk. He sat on the bed, mulling over what his 'guiding spirit' had told him.

Yes, the boy was actually considering the possibility that what the talking waffle had said was somehow significant.

Then again, it was not impossible for there to still be something in Borgan and Burkes. After all, there was the possibility that the man had indeed kept some of his more unorthodox and unsavory wares hidden somewhere within the shop. That, and Harry really had nothing better to do after getting his school supplies. He couldn't train _all_ of the time, even he had come to realize this after spending a year in almost constant exhaustion due to his excessive use of magic. Hell, he was easily a head shorter than most of the other boys in his year because the nutrients that should've been used for his growth were being burned away to fuel his magic!

Of course, him eating conjured food whose nutrients ceased existing halfway through being assimilated into his system also may have had something to do with it… he had read somewhere that even the best of wizards didn't get all that they would expect from conjured meals. Harry estimated he was only truly getting half of what he was conjuring.

Yeah, the boy needed recovery time… and to buy a pair of real shoes. He didn't want to have to deal with frostbite again. Getting his own supply of food would help too.

He then began to wonder what time it was. He had started waiting at the bus stop around one in the afternoon, and the ride with Karen had probably taken a couple of hours, maybe two and a half due to the rain… so it was probably around three thirty. He looked up at the clock, and was satisfied to find that his assessment was indeed correct.

Harry sighed, and flicked his wand at the trunk to summon a book. With the need for dinner long off, and the downpour of rain, he had little else to do but study.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"…wha time izzit…" said a sleepy voice. Harry sat up, his book sliding off of his face. He must have fallen asleep while reading, he reasoned. Checking the clock, he saw that it was the next morning. His stomach roared in fury, as he had forgotten to eat dinner the night before. He stood shakily, and stumbled out of his room. He carefully walked down the stares, and saw that the bar was barely filled in. Most of the residing patrons were still asleep, and Harry saw that Tom had just gotten up and was preparing the bar.

"Good Morning, Mr. Potter!" said Tom, setting down a glass. "Can I get you anything?" Harry sat at the bar.

"Just some waffles," said Harry. Momentarily, his order was placed in front of him and he dug in. He reached into his pocket, and pulled out a sack. There were a few sickles, and Harry slapped down three. "Keep the change."

"Thank you, Mr. Potter." Tom looked outside, scrutinizing the horizon. "It looks like today won't be too bad; maybe a bit of drizzling, but the skies look clear for the most part."

"How much do I owe you for the room?" asked Harry. Tom looked at the calendar.

"You will be here for the remainder of the summer, right?" asked the man. Harry nodded, eating his waffles. "It will be about twenty galleons then. You can just pay me after you get the money from your vault."

With that taken care of, Harry finished his breakfast and made his way into the alley. The sun was just overhead, and there were few people walking among the street. Shops were just opening, and Gringotts would remain closed for at least another couple of hours. Harry, careful not to draw too much attention to himself, strolled into Knockturn Alley when nobody was looking. This proved to not be too difficult, as there were few people out in the alley.

Like its counterpart, Knockturn Alley was very cavernous and empty at this time of morning, and Harry doubted anybody would begin roaming the streets until well into the afternoon. Walking through the barren streets, a condemned shop caught Harry's eye. It was Borgan and Burkes. Ducking under the red tape, Harry entered the shop.

It was very empty now, with the walls bare of its previous wares. Harry walked up to the counter, drawing his hand on it. He picked up his hand, which was now covered in dust. The place was filthy, and had obviously not been set foot in quite a while. Harry looked around, and saw that everything had been confiscated. The entire shop was empty.

Harry turned his attention to the desk. He had, briefly, considered becoming an auror when he graduated from Hogwarts, but soon discarded that interest when he realized he didn't want to be a tool for the Ministry. However, while such a possibility held his interest, Harry had done some studying on Ministry procedures.

In this kind of situation, aurors would first scan all objects for lethal, on-contact-activated curses and wards, and then remove them from the premises to be processed and destroyed, or stored somewhere, depending on how dangerous they were or their properties. After this initial sweep, the aurors brought in ward specialists in order to detect any cloaking wards so that they could find hidden objects. After this mid-sweep, the aurors and other ministry officials did a concluding, physical sweep of the premises.

However, that final sweep was not always effective.

Harry leaned against the desk, tensed the muscles in his legs, and pushed. He pushed hard. At first, nothing happened. The desk would not budge. Harry relaxed, and then lowered himself to the floor. He peeked at the bottom of the desk. Pulling out his wand, Harry made a hole with a severing charm, and peaked inside.

The desk was nailed into the floor. Retreating to the wall, Harry made a larger hole in the desk, large enough to fit through fairly easily. He crawled inside, careful not to smack his head into the opposite wall of the desk. The large piece of furniture was indeed hallow, and quite spacious. However, it was empty.

'Lumos,' Harry thought. A beam of light came from the tip of his wand, much like a muggle flash light, and Harry looked to the floor. It too was covered in a thick layer of dust. 'Scourgify.' The dust was eliminated, and Harry saw a small, tiny keyhole in the floor. Harry raised his wand, scrutinizing the walls of the desk. They were bare, and he could not see any sort of key. He returned his attention to the lock. "Alohamora," he said. Nothing happened, as he had expected. He considered just busting open the lock, but reasoned that he could damage anything that it was keeping, and also that it might have had several traps.

Harry crawled out of the desk. He looked around the empty, cavernous shop. Raising his wand, Harry flicked it in various directions. "Accio key!" he said. Uttering the incantation usually improved the power of a spell, especially if it was not required. He listened carefully. Obviously the key was indeed hidden somewhere, possibly within the walls. "Accio key!" he said again, and again.

Tap.

Harry froze, his wand pointed at the back left corner of the room. "Accio key!" he whispered.

Tap.

Harry walked towards the source of the sound. He was just centimeters from the wall, and stuck his ear to the wall's painted surface. "Accio key," he muttered. A tap was heard, just to his right. He moved over, and said the spell again. Lower. He repeated the procedure.

There… right on the dot.

Harry stepped back, and cut a large circle into the wall, centered on where he heard the key. Levitating the piece of wall away, Harry found a box embedded into the wall. Carefully walking over, Harry scrutinized the rectangular object. Borgan had access to many a dangerous substance, and he given the impression of being rather paranoid. Harry levitated the box, and with another flick of his wand flipped it open. It was good that he had stayed a safe distance away, as a large purple cloud of corrosive dust exploded from the box. Harry backed away farther, as the dust approached him, hissing in irritation as some of the dust hit him in the forearm. The skin turned a dark red, and began itching and burning.

Luckily it was his left forearm, which wasn't his dominant arm, as the arm that the irritated skin belonged to started feeling numb after the initial irritation. It fell limp at his side and try as he might, Harry could not move it more than a few centimeters up and make a loose fist.

'This shit better be temporary,' grumbled Harry. He did _not_ feel like explaining to anyone why his left arm had ceased to function appropriately. Shrugging it off, Harry carefully approached the box, as the cloud had dissipated and no longer posed any danger. Looking inside, Harry saw a key, which was oddly in a more modern style. 'It appears that Mr. Borgan was not as prejudiced as most would think,' thought Harry.

Crawling underneath the desk once again, Harry stuck the muggle key into the equally muggle lock. It fit perfectly. He turned the key, and was met with a satisfying 'click.' Harry dug his fingers into the crack of the trap door, and along with some help by pulling the key at an angle; Harry managed to open up the secret compartment.

'Lumos,' he thought, and his wand illuminated the dark room beneath the shop's floor. He saw a ladder. Carefully, Harry climbed onto the ladder and began his descent into the hidden cellar. He idly wondered what he would find down here; Books? Potions ingredients? Dark objects of unsavory properties that would sooner rip him in half than aide him? Some corpse that would come back to life at the presence of blood and then pledge itself to him as his servant?

Eventually, the boy met the ground. He was slightly relieved, as climbing with only one hand was rather difficult. Harry raised his lit wand, and saw a torch. Harry tapped it, muttering 'incendio.' The torch lit, as did other throughout the cellar, which proved to be rather large.

There were many, many objects within the large room, and most of them either illegal or highly dangerous, from what he could tell. Several rolled up Persian rugs were in the corner, probably smuggled in, next to which was a sword-rack with several deadly looking blades which ranged from impossibly massive claymores to daggers. Above the sword rack was a shelf housing many jars and vials, probably of illegal potions ingredients and poisons.

Harry walked over to the sword rack, looking over the bladed weapons. He held no illusions that he could even lift some of the larger swords, especially a claymore. He was simply too small as a twelve year old. He ended up nicking one of the daggers. It was roughly a foot long and three of his fingers in width, with a leather hilt and a black blade. Looking closely, he could see faint silvery runes etched into the blade. He conjured a simple sheath and wrapped the dagger around his thigh.

While potions were not precisely his forte, he wasn't a complete fool concerning the subject either. He summoned the many ingredients and such on the shelves and put them in his trunk for later analysis, making sure none of them had a big label saying 'DON'T SHAKE!' on them, as well as anything similar.

After finishing up with that, Harry began scrutinizing the rest of the room. There was a large bookshelf to the side. The odd thing was that the books were not _on_ the bookshelf. Most of them were just piled on the floor, some of them half open. Harry noticed that the dust on the shelves was inconsistent with the amount in the rest of the room; if the ministry had managed to get in here, they would have confiscated the books, swords, and potion's ingredients. Someone else must have gotten in here… Mr. Borgan, perhaps?

No. Borgan would have been much gentler with the books… and Harry had sensed _something_ on that night, and the older man had disappeared not too long afterwards. It was possible that the man had indeed been the one to move the books into such disarray, but Harry's gut told him differently. Whoever had done away with Borgan was after something… a book, most likely.

Wait. A book…

Harry felt a shock go through his body. 'The book,' he thought. Whoever had taken away Mr. Borgan was after the book he had bought. Harry new the book was not normal; he could sense it. And despite being locked in the cellar, the books that Harry found on the floor were not very remarkable so much as they were simply illegal. There was nothing especially unique about the spells he found when skimming through them… mostly just really nasty curses, many of which were unnecessarily overly elaborate, some of which downright ridiculous.

'Turning the nose-hairs into living barbed wire and ripping apart the victim's skull and forming into a pie-mold to carry his brain, and then turning the pubic hairs into snakes that start biting at his or her loins?' Harry thought. 'Original and very diabolical… but why not just blow there heads off?'

Harry tossed the book away into his trunk, figuring that the bizarre spells would be an amusing read if nothing else. He then drew his attention to a large object to his right… it was a tall, rectangular box covered in a white sheet. Tentatively, Harry removed the sheet with his wand ready to curse the hell out of anything that might have been hidden.

It was an eye.

Harry stared at it. The eye was sitting atop a wooden stand, with what looked like the optic nerve wrapped tightly around the wood. The eye itself was also quite odd… the iris, instead of blue, brown, or even green, was a blood red. However, the oddities did not end there; the pupil was most unusual. No, it was not a slit, but a spiral. Harry briefly wondered how a spiraled pupil would work, but figured it was probably there for aesthetic purposes.

The eye moved. The muscles of the iris flexed as it stared at Harry intently.

Harry couldn't react fast enough as the optic nerve, which was very long, tore through the glass and struck at his throat, whipping at his hand so hard that he dropped his wand. Harry fell to his knees as the nerve squeezed his neck, and the eyeball was tugged out of the case. Harry was forced to contain a pain-filled screech as the optic nerve's butt end dug into the corner of his right eye, knocking off his glasses, and tore out the visual organ. At this point, the optic nerve loosened up on Harry throat, allowing the scream to come from his mouth.

There was a splat as his _real_ eye hit the ground, and a pop as the red eyes embedded itself into the eye socket. A sense of vertigo hit Harry, and he fell onto his side, blood trailing down his face and his eyes staring blankly ahead.

**_0o0o0o0o0o0_**

"Milady," said the man. The woman looked up from her tea, cold blue eyes focusing intently on the cloaked subordinate before her.

"What do you want from me?" she asked. The man shifted uneasily. He opened his mouth for a moment, but clamped it shut, unsure of what to say. "Speak!"

"My apologies, Madame," said the man. He took a deep breath. "May I ask you a question?"

Sighing, the woman set her tea down and glared. "You may."

"…You know where _it_ is, but you do not allow my own subordinates and I to retrieve it," said the man in a rush. The woman stood, and slowly sauntered over to him. The man gulped, keeping his eyes trained to the snow-white floor. The woman, clad in robes of the utmost beauty, stood over him.

"Look up at me," she ordered. The man did so, and was immediately assaulted with an unseen force pinching at his neck and dragging him up into the air. He could still breathe, but it proved to be difficult. He looked at his superior, and saw cold fury burning in her eyes. "Do you question the authority of the Four Elders?" she hissed with the deadliness of an eagle on the hunt.

"N-never… ma'am…" he wheezed. The woman nodded, her brows knit together and released him. He fell ungracefully into a heap on the ground, taking deep and greedy breaths.

"To answer your question," she said calmly, as if nothing had happened, "I am curious as to what _it_ wishes to do with _him_.

"That thing has always acted of its own will, endowed upon it by its master," she continued. "I want to see what its purpose is, and the others agree with me. Have I made myself sufficiently clear?"

"Yes milady, of course milady," said the man, his breathing returning to normal. "Thank you."

"Be gone," she practically snarled. "I must be back to my tea."

The man did as ordered, scurrying away in terror of his superior. The woman sat down once again. All would unfold as it should, and if it didn't… any anomalies would be taken care of, and upstarts would be crushed underfoot without any form of mercy. This was as things had been for the past millennia… and if things went in accordance with the scenario, they would continue to do so.

"I notice that you did not elaborate on the boy himself," said a new voice. The woman looked up, seeing a black-haired man with a long beard and green robes standing at a doorway. He stood tall and imposing, giving off an aura of power and danger. "You are aware of his… unanticipated development, no?"

The woman nodded, her eyes narrowing. "Indeed, old friend," she said the last part with minimal sarcasm, "I am aware that he scenario might be compromised if he is allowed to grow anymore. However, I was under the impression that _you_ had the boy under control?"

"Yes," said the man. "But I'm afraid that my underling's attempts have merely backfired. No matter what happens, the boy just grows stronger!" The man began pacing, his mouth in a frown and his brow furrowed. "I knew we should have simply killed him and be done with it at the first sign of trouble." The woman sighed.

"You know that, and I know that," she agreed. "However, our master did not allow that course of action. I suspect that he experiences some bizarre amusement by the possibility of his own design being put in peril," she continued, speaking as if she had a bad taste in her mouth. "Either that, or he's finally gone off of his rocker."

The man shrugged, a small smile tugging at his lips. "Don't worry," he said. He grinned, his yellow teeth bared. "I think that by the end of this coming year, he shall be well taken care of, but not by _our_ hand… at least, not directly."

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

His first thought was, 'Ow.'

Harry's eyes, now one red and one green snapped open in an instant. Slowly, he lifted himself to his feat, standing shakily with one hand on the adjacent wall. Broken glass littered the floor, and Harry felt blood trailing down the right side of his face. He licked the corner of his lips, and his tongue was met the coppery taste of his own blood.

Starting from behind his newly embedded visual organ, Harry felt a piercing headache wreaking havoc throughout his skull. It was as if a thousand fire ants were having a feast on his brain. He tried to breath, and found that he was also bleeding from his nose. He coughed, and then sneezed, sending blood splattering on the wall.

He was in bad shape, and his stomach was roaring in fury. How long had he been unconscious? He looked down at his watch, and squinted his eyes a little to see that at least five hours had passed since he had entered the shop. While his vision had improved, he noted, his left eye still required visual aid and thus obstructed his vision. His arm was still numb, but he could move it a little bit more now. It was very stiff, but he could work with it. After replacing his glasses on his face (along with removing the right lens), Harry found his wand lying not too far from a puddle of blood.

Harry, with some difficulty, shrank and stowed his trunk in his pocket before making his slow and agonizing ascent to the first floor of the condemned shop. HE managed to drag himself out of the desk, and saw that the clouds had begun rolling into the Alley. It wasn't raining just yet, but from the looks of things the weather would soon be taking a turn for the worse. Harry shambled over to the door, stopping to take a short rest, and then proceeded to exit the store.

Harry James Potter found himself face to face with a woman. She towered over his lean and short frame, her black hair sticking out haphazardly from the myriad of white bandages covering her face, neck, and arms, clad in only that and a white hospital gown. Violet eyes glared at him through the bandages, and Harry heard the woman snarl, a wand appearing in her hand.

"You…" she hissed, her voice sounding hoarse. "You… are _her_ spawn…"

Harry froze, but then his wand snapped in front of him, with a curse at the tip of his tongue. However, the woman was too fast for him. She tackled the boy to the ground, pinning him to the shop's floor. Harry felt her hot breath on his face, and her eyes burned into his.

"I'm going to kill you," she wheezed. Harry tried to break free from her grip, but she was too heavy for his weakened body. "But no… not yet… first I'm going to have some _fun_."

The last thing Harry remembered was a flash of red light hitting and then blacking out. However, he had one last thought:

'This has happened _way_ too much in the last couple of days.'


	9. Kidnapped

I know, it's late... I'm a lazy bastard.

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Nine: Kidnapped**_

Groggily, Harry lifted his eye lids and awoke from his forced slumber. He tried to move, to stand, but failed as he was being restrained. As his vision cleared, he managed to make out, due to his lack of glasses at that moment in time, the cords tying his wrists and legs to the chair he was currently occupying. From what he could discern, it was a fairly old-fashioned chair, probably from some upper-class home. It was ornately decorated, with purple cushions that he found rather comfortable despite his given situation. He shook his head, trying to become more awake and clear away the grogginess. A lock of black hair went over the right side of his face, shielding his spiral-eye from view.

"Ah…" said a voice, cold as ice, from somewhere in the distance. Harry squinted, barely seeing a tall and curvy figure approaching him. It held up what looked like a limb, with some sort of clear-ish blob attached to it. "You need these don't you?" The figure cackled, and Harry concluded that it was a woman, due to her voice. Harry said nothing, struggling against his bonds. "Ah, silly boy, that won't work! I may be magically inept thanks to your bitch-mother's handiwork, but I can still tie a good knot."

"...who are you?" asked Harry. The woman, although he could not see it, sneered beneath the bandages of her face.

"Oh, come now, Harry," she said condescendingly. "I'm sure a clever boy such as you can figure it out… after all, you were right there when your dear mother mutilated me."

Harry blinked, trying to recall. "You are… Bartimeaus?" he offered. He was rewarded with a shriek of outrage and a backhand (he was pretty sure, it could've been a left hook) to the face.

"That is a masculine name, you twit! It's _Bellatrix_, _Bellatrix Lestrange_," she snarled, now mere centimeters from his own face. Hers was covered entirely in white and grayish bandages, her violet eyes staring at him madly through two slits in the patchwork. Her black hair haphazardly grew through the bandages, making her hair messier than even Harry's.

"Oh… right," said Harry. He suppressed a smirk as the woman screamed more, before she fell into a fit of coughs and wheezes. Evidently, she was still recovering from her near-decade long coma. Harry idly wondered if that stunner she had hit him with was the pinnacle of her powers at the current time. He then noticed something rather odd about his state of dress. "Why am wearing only my pants?"

Bellatrix sneered at him as she stood again, her wand trembling in hand. The mad (in both senses of the term) woman glared upon her captive.

"You see, child, I couldn't exactly allow you to keep all of your possessions in hand," she explained slowly. "Who knows, you could have had in your clothing… portkeys, special charms to aide you in escape, who knows!" Harry tilted his head, allowing her image to become fuzzy and letting his eyes rest.

"…why do I still have my pants, then?" he asked. "And why am I here anyway? If you wanted to talk, you could've just asked." Bellatrix groaned, slapping herself in the forehead.

"Potter, you're being _kidnapped_," she said bluntly. "You do realize that, right?" Harry blinked.

"Oh. Okay." Sighing in contempt, Bellatrix continued.

"As for why you still have your pants… do not question me! Be glad that I felt generous enough to not leave you without any sort of covering!" she roared adamantly. Harry grimaced, wondering what to do about the spit that had flown onto his face from her tantrum. The woman looked at him intently, and then grinned (or at least he figured, he couldn't see through the bandages, or even the details of her form to begin with anyway). She held up his glasses, centimeters from his face. "Do you want these?" she asked sweetly.

Harry said nothing, but his eyes stared at the glasses. He knew she was playing with him, torturing him, and tempting him. She was trying to break him. What a pity (for her) that that would not work… but deception was part of warfare.

Harry, swallowing his pride, jerked his head forward to try and get to his glasses, but to no avail as the woman before him pulled them away, laughing all the while.

"Silly boy, did you really think it would be that easy?" She laughed again, before pulling out her wand. Her eyes narrowed, and Harry knew that whatever was coming could not be good. "I want you to beg, Potter… I want you to _beg_. _Crucio!_"

A red and erratic beam of light shot out of the tip of her wand. Harry stiffened, bracing himself for the coming curse. He knew that the cruciatus curse was the worst torture spell ever made by man… what a surprise that all he felt was not pain.

"…that really itches," he said blandly, looking down at the beam of light hitting his chest without much concern. "So that's why you didn't take off my pants… you spent your energy earlier scanning my clothing, but could only know for certain that my pants were not charmed, and so to play it safe, you removed everything else. You can't even torture me." Bellatrix, now sitting and panting, glared up at the young man.

"Brilliant deduction," she said venomously, sarcasm dripping from her maw. "That stunner was all I had…" She stood, leaning close to the boy. She whispered, "I hate you, boy… more than you could ever know… causing you unbearable pain would bring me the _utmost_ joy, but it seems I lack the power for it right now." She then giggled, ramming herself against him and pushing him roughly against the chair's back and into the wall. She panted for a time, but caught her breath soon enough. "Don't worry, though, child. You and I will have plenty of _fun_ when the time comes… you'll be my little pet, groveling at my feet by the time I'm done with you."

The mad woman withdrew, twirling Harry's glasses between her fingers. Bellatrix placed them on a shelf, just close enough for Harry to see without too much trouble, but to far away for him to even hope to reach. She walked to the door, and opened it, before looking back at her captive.

"Good night, Harry!" she said, cackling. There was a slam as she closed the door, and Harry was alone.

Harry let his head fall, taking in a deep breath. He had been kidnapped by a madwoman who wanted vengeance for his mother's 'crime.' Said woman was probably going to torture him and try to break him over time, once she had fully regained her magical powers. She had taken his belongings (save for his pants), and tied him down to a chair. Harry could not remove himself from said chair. Bellatrix Lestrange had defeated him. He would not give up though.

Instead, he swore vengeance.

"You know not what hell you have wrought, Lestrange."

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Hermione Jane Granger, second year Gryffindor girl and at the top of her class, was worried sick. Why, you may ask? Well, there were several reasons. One, she was always worried, whether it be for her grades or the possibility of stepping a toe out of line. Two, her dream man, Gilderoy Lockhart** (1)**, was now her Defense against the Dark Arts professor and she didn't want to make a fool of herself. Yes, despite being a tad more mature and grown up then her peers, young Granger was still susceptible to handsome men with shiny teeth and an over-inflated reputation. It had never occurred to her that he was an idiot.

Case in point: "FEAR THE CORNISH PIXIES!"

Anyway, we're getting off topic. The third (and most important) reason for her worry was the fact that Harry Potter, one of the only children at Hogwarts she considered herself on friendly terms with, was missing. She had brought this to the attention of his head of house, Professor Snape, who in turn told Dumbledore of this disturbing development.

"I will alert the Ministry of Master Potter's disappearance, child, do not worry," the elderly wizard had said, his eyes twinkling. "I'm sure they will find him shortly. The boy most likely simply missed the train and is waiting at the station."

However, days passed, and Harry did not appear. Posters had been set up all throughout London with a picture of the boy and his name, but no information had turned up. Hermione wished she could yell and scream at them to do more… but she knew that the Ministry had done all it could do.

Sitting in the library, looking at a large tome but not reading it, Hermione had an epiphany.

"I'm lonely," she whispered, her words swallowed up by the sheer cavernous size of the library and reaching nobody's ears but her own. The girl, who had just recently turned thirteen, packed up her books and slowly wandered out of the library. Dinner would be starting soon, and her stomach demanded to be filled. Had she paid attention to where she was going, she would have been able to avoid an incoming obstacle.

"EEP!" shouted two voices in unison, and two girls fell to the ground and were buried under a pile of books. Hermione sat up, taking a copy of _Mighty Magics_ off of her head and placing it on the table next to her. "Are you alright?" she asked in worry, looking at the girl in front of her.

"Ow…" The girl, a Ravenclaw about a little more than a head shorter than Hermione, sat up and rubbed a spot on her skull. Evidently a book had hit her there and it would probably form a bruise. Realizing what had just happened, the girl squeaked and stood up, gathering her books. "Sorry, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to, I couldn't see where I was going, I—"

"It's okay," said Hermione holding up her hands as a sign of peace. She picked up a book, and held it out to the girl. "Really, I should've been paying more attention, it isn't your fault." The girl nodded uncertainly. "Um, I'm Hermione, by the way, Hermione Granger!" Hermione shook the other girl's hand, nearly crushing it with her own.

"I-I'm Su Li," cried the girl, bewildered at Hermione's enthusiasm. After Hermione had let go of her poor hand, Su stood awkwardly. "So, you're a Gryffindor, right?" she asked. Hermione nodded, albeit reluctantly. "Is… something wrong?"

Her query was answered with the entrance a tall, red-headed Gryffindor. His name was Ronald Weasley, and as far as Hermione was concerned (and soon enough Su Li, although she would fail to be as vocal about it), he was a complete prat.

"Well, if it isn't the know-it-all snake lover and…" he looked down at Su. "Who're you, short-stuff?" Su gritted her teeth, but said nothing. It wasn't as if she could do anything anyway.

'Sticks and stones, Su… sticks and stones…'

"Anyway," continued the tall boy, "What are you doing here, Granger? Looking for more books to study and show-off from?" Hermione frowned, glaring at the boy in front of her.

"No, I'm just studying for the test we have in a couple of days, Weasley." Hermione sniffed. "Shouldn't you be doing the same? I mean, you fai—"

"Shut up!" retorted Weasley. "Not everyone is as smart as you, Granger, and I'm sick of you being such a know-it-all. What are you trying to prove anyway? And what the hell were you thinking, being _friends_ with that Slytherin garbage, Potter?" Hermione's hands balled into fists, and her face was starting to go red. "What's the matter? Miss your little Slytherin boyfriend? Ha h—"

"What's going on in here?" asked a voice. The three second years turned their heads and saw Neville Longbottom walk into the area, a bemused look on his face. Upon seeing Hermione, he frowned. "Ah, Miss Granger," he said with slight distaste. "It is a pity about Potter's disappearance." Hermione glared at him.

"You don't sound very displeased about it," replied the brunette. Neville smiled.

"Well, to be perfectly honest, no," he admitted. "Frankly, I think that Hogwarts, and the student populous, is better off without Potter running amok. He was a bad seed, ready to grow into a right nasty dark wizard if he had been allowed to do so. In fact," he continued while narrowing his eyes, "I doubt he's in any danger. I bet he's joined up with some remnant Death Eaters."

Neville sneered, oblivious to Hermione's pale and shaking fist.

"So what?" she said lowly, her voice a dangerous hiss. "You think Harry's evil? You think he's evil? Why?" Neville's eyebrows raised in a gesture of genuine puzzlement.

"Why, Granger… I thought that much was obvious," said Neville. "He's a Slytherin. Most Slytherin's come from Dark Families, and the house itself promotes all that Blood Purity and Dark Arts use. The hat even _considering_ him for Slytherin, let alone actually sorting him into it, just shows that he's nothing but trouble."

Neville smirked.

"Although, I suppose he couldn't have caused too much trouble. He really wasn't too powerful, and he didn't even pay attention in class! How he got into Second Year is beyond me." Neville leaned against a bookshelf, silent while Weasley, being a loyal dog, laughed at his friend's critique of Harry Potter.

Hermione, however, was not amused. Su, bless her heart, really didn't feel like sticking around. She had always been able to sense trouble, and her 'sixth sense' was going haywire. Unfortunately for her, the only way out was blocked by Longbottom and Weasley. Had she been a more vocal person, she would be whispering 'fuck-fuck-fuck-…' a mile a minute.

"EXCUSE ME?" shouted Hermione. Although every part of her screamed at her to rip the boy into shreds, she could only bring herself to yell. "THAT IS THE MOST IGNORANT, JUDGEMENTAL, AND JUST PLAIN _STUPID_ THING I HAVE EVER HEARD YOU SAY! YOU BARELY EVEN KNOW HARRY! I WON'T HAVE IT! JUST BECAUSE HE'S IN SLYTHERIN DOESN'T MEAN HE'S EVIL! I KNOW FOR A FACT THAT SOME SLYTHERINS ARE PERFECTLY NICE! IN FACT, HARRY IS ACTUALLY _RIDICULED_ BY HIS OWN HOUSE ANYWAY! DON'T YOU GO AROUND JUDGING HIM!

"HE IS NOT LAZY! I'VE SEEN HIM STUDYING FROM TEXT BOOKS THAT I CAN BARELY UNDERSTAND MYSELF, AND IF YOU ACTUALLY TOOK THE TIME TO PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT HE DOES IN CLASS, YOU'D KNOW HE ALREADY KNOWS THE BULK OF THE MATERIAL WE'RE LEARNING!" she continued. She paused, catching her breath. Upon hearing a slow clapping, Hermione blushed.

"Ah," said Weasley, "Does da wittle know-it-all have a cwush?" he said in a rather sickening imitation of a toddler's voice. Longbottom indulged himself in some chuckling at his crony's antics. Hermione's blush darkened, but it was not of embarrassment: it was of fury.

"No," she said vehemently. Su could've sworn the air around them had turned to ice. "_I_ just know Harry a bit more than you two… _imbeciles_… do."

"Er," said Su. "Hermione…" The girl held up a hand.

"Hold on Su, I'm not done here," she spat. "HARRY IS MOST DEFINITELY NOT WEAK, YOU LITTLE ARSE-HOLE! YOU KNOW HOW HE TOOK DOWN THAT TROLL BY HIMSELF! IF HE WERE AS YOU HAD DESCRIBED HIM, HE COULDN'T HAVE DONE THAT!" Su gulped, remembering seeing the teachers' transportation of the troll's mutilated cadaver to the grounds for proper disposal. However, that was not what was important right now.

Su gripped Hermione's bicep, and leant to the brunette's ear.

"Hermione… we're not alone…" she whispered. Hermione stiffened, and looked past Longbottom and Weasley.

"…bugger…" she whispered.

They were everywhere… students from all years and houses. They had heard her rant, possibly from all the way down the adjacent corridor to the library, and had come running at the source of the disturbance. Madame Pince stood in the background, absolutely furious at Hermione's breach of library protocol, and the students couldn't help snickering at what had happened. Some of the crueler ones were laughing out loud.

"_Granger and Potter, sitting in a tree_," they sang, in a great show of maturity. Hermione, fighting back tears and the urge to yell some more, fled the library, even knocking down several others in the process.

Although she would have rather just left this entire situation behind her, Su couldn't help but go after the girl. She knew what it was to be teased… that, and she agreed with everything Hermione had said.

'She's right, Harry's not like other Slytherins…' Su recalled that day he had helped her (sort of) with the levitation charm.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Harry was bending towards his right forearm, trying to chew off the cords that were keeping him tied down to the chair. He was not very successful, unfortunately. The cords were just too tough. Frustrated, he bounced in the chair in an attempt to spring out of it. Naturally, this was not successful either. He relaxed, closed his eyes, and tried to calm down. He needed to do this differently… he needed a new angle… He stiffened upon hearing footsteps.

"Ha! I see you've been trying escape," said Bellatrix. She bent forward, looking at him from centimeters away, and her violet eyes burned. "My power is returning, Potter." She gleefully pulled out her wand. "_Crucio!_"

Instead of an itch, Harry had a very powerful ache and burning sensation spread throughout his body. It was not unbearable however. More like a very large sunburn. After a few seconds, Bellatrix released the spell.

"Damn… still not enough," she muttered. Her eyes returned to Harry, who was sitting calmly in the chair. Her eyes narrowed. "Boy… be glad that I'm still not powerful enough to torture you for real. But don't worry;" she grinned evilly, "your day will come."

She stood up and left the room without another word, slamming the door shut behind her. Harry slumped in his chair, plotting his next move. Chewing on the cord would not work, and he had already been stuck here for a day. The woman had only fed him small sliced of bread and water during his time here, and as for his, ahem, 'other' needs…

Well, let's just not go into too much detail with that, agreed?

Harry's stomach roared in outrage, demanding to be filled. Bellatrix, giving him only water and slices of bread, usually just stuffed them into his mouth and let him do the rest himself. He had already been fed today, but he knew he needed more.

'_Close… eye… left eye…_'

Harry stiffened, looking around the room in alarm.

'_Left eye… close… now…_'

"Who's there?" asked Harry calmly. His eyes narrowed.

'_Close your left eye!_'

Shrugging, Harry did so. What he was met with was… strange, to say the least, and fascinating, to say the most. The world around him had changed drastically. He was surrounded by utter darkness, and he could see a strange mist in front of him. Looking towards the distance he could faintly see a blur of fowl looking mist surrounding another figure, who he could only assume to be Bellatrix.

'So… I can see pretty colors now?' he thought.

'_No,'_ said the voice in his head. '_You are seeing the world on the magic-spectrum._'

'Oh… neat,' thought Harry. 'Uh, who are you?'

The voice remained silent.

Sighing, Harry re-opened his left eye and blew a lock of hair out of his face. He began to contemplate this latest development. He knew that there was something special about his eye… and now he knew what it was. Or, he knew at least _part_ of what made it special. Something told him the latest addition to his anatomy was a lot more complicated than at first glance.

However, as interesting as seeing in the magical spectrum was, how was that going to help him in his current predicament was unknown to the young man. Wait… Harry suddenly remembered something he had learned whilst reading a book on magical theory.

All magical organisms (wizards, phoenixes, dragons, etc) had, by definition, magic. For the most part, their magic manifested itself as a wispy aura around them that could not be seen by the naked eye. The purpose of the wand in wizards' cases was to conduct the magical aura in order to perform a spell. The shaft of the wand allowed a wizard to conduct his magic with great dexterity, and the core allowed the magic to be augmented and allow more complicated spells to be performed.

Harry closed his left eye, and looked down at his right hand. His own aura, a reddish mist, surrounded him and lazed about in the air. Concentrating, Harry willed his aura to dig itself under the cords tying down his arm. He compressed the magic, sliding it beneath the twine and cords restraining him. Then, when he thought he had enough of it, Harry let the magic expand beneath the twin.

BANG!

Harry hissed in pain as his right arm's skin turned raw and the remains of the cords whipped him in the face, spreading throughout the room. Experimenting, Harry moved around his arm. He smirked. He was free, with minimal damage. He silently thanked the voice. He doubted he would've been able to wandlessly conduct his magic without being able to see his aura **(2).**

Harry, with only his right eye, looking up and saw that Bellatrix, or at least what he thought was Bellatrix, was rushing down the stairs, albeit slowly. Harry guessed she was still having trouble moving around.

Quickly, he untied his other hand, and then his legs, before rushing out of the room but grabbing his glasses on the way out, haphazardly slapping them onto his face. Now with both eyes open, Harry rushed down the hall in an attempt to find a place to hide. Hearing shrieks and footsteps, he went into a closet and climbed up onto the top shelf, hiding himself among the coats and such within.

Closing his left eye again, He watched as Bellatrix checked within the room he had been held within, before rushing down the hall and systematically checking each and every room, looking for him. She stopped, and Harry could tell she was seething by the fluctuations of her magic aura.

"POTTER!" she screamed. "I'LL RIP YOU IN HALF WHEN I FIND YOU! I SWEAR IT! I'LL MAKE IT QUICK IF YOU COME TO ME FIRST!"

Harry said nothing, opening his left eye and curling up. His breathing slowed. Tonight, when Bellatrix slept, he would try and get some actual food. He doubted Bellatrix could set up any traps or wards in her magically weakened state. She would probably keep searching for him all day, or at least until she finally became exhausted.

Harry took off his glasses, blinking in an attempt to get rid of the slight headache that had developed due to the now obsolete prescription, courtesy of his new eye. Following the logic that his right eye was perfect twenty-twenty while his left was the same as it had been, Harry popped out the right lens and replaced his glasses on his face.

Relatively safe, as far as he could tell, Harry began planning his next move. His trunk and wand were probably being kept somewhere by Bellatrix, but where? Perhaps they were in her room? Or maybe in some sort of vault within the house?

For that matter, where was he anyway?

Resolving to find out later, Harry closed his eyes, falling into a light sleep. If the door did open, he would be awake and alert enough to retaliate. His last thought was, 'Twelve year olds shouldn't have to go through all this shit.'

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Silently, Harry awoke within the closet. Closing his left eye, he surveyed the surrounding area. He saw Bellatrix's aura in the floor above him, relaxed and floating about. She was sleeping, if he was correct. Just to be careful, Harry surveyed the rest of the area, and saw another aura. It was small, and a sickly yellow color, walking around a long ways from Harry. He didn't have to worry about it, as long as the yellow one stayed away.

Harry slowly climbed down the shelf and onto the floor of the closet, and then opened the door, careful not to make any sound. Luckily, the hinges made no squeaks or anything of the like, and he slipped out without making too much noise. Closing the door, Harry began searching for his next target: The kitchen.

He was starving!

After stealthily navigating the halls of whatever structure he was imprisoned in, he finally came across a kitchen. The yellow aura was far away, on the other side of the house, and was also sleeping from what he could tell.

Harry slowly opened the pantry doors, peaking inside. He needed to eat something that didn't require cooking or preparation… he didn't have time to stand idle. A satisfied smile wormed its way onto his lips and was soon replaced with a lopsided frown as he caught site of a few loaves of bread, beef jerky, some jugs of water, a bag of fried bat-wings, and other non-descript foodstuffs that required no cooking and were not out of place in an all-magical household but most of which could not be conceived by the average muggle due to difference in culture which would ultimately lead to one of the longest and most epic run-on sentences to ever grace your unworthy eyes that sadly just so happens to end right now **(3)**.

"And they call me weird…" Harry muttered.

After grabbing a bag or two of food and two jugs of water, Harry closed his left eye to make sure that the coast was clear, as well as to make sure that there were no magical properties to the food he was carrying (i.e. poison, tracking potions, etc). He then fled the kitchen.

After a long time of sneaking around, Harry managed to find a nice walk-in closet to hide in. Wherever he was, it was huge. Harry guessed that it had at least three full floors, and had enough rooms to house several families. If he played his cards right, Bellatrix wouldn't be able to find him for quite some time.

Harry finished making his little 'nest' inside of the closet, safely hidden behind a curtain of robes, dresses, and cloaks, and began feasting upon his treasure-trove of edibles.

Fifteen minutes later, Harry leaned against the wall and held his stomach in content. He'd never thought that any meal would taste better than the feasts at Hogwarts. Slowly, he began drifting off into a light sleep yet again.

Hours later, his eyes flew open in an instant. His mental clock told him that it was nearing morning, and Bellatrix would no doubt be looking for him. While she lacked the magical strength to find him within the magical manor, it was not too far fetched to surmise that she had instated the 'no in or out' properties of the massive house. That way, she knew he was in the house. He'd have to think of an escape plan soon, as she would probably gain the strength to more effectively track him down within days.

He had to move fast.

Closing his left eye, Harry surveyed his surroundings. He was in the clear. Carefully, he opened the door and began sneaking through the halls. Periodically, he checked his surroundings with his trusty eye (he'd have to think up a name for it), but was careful not to use it _too_ much. It saw things in a magical spectrum, not light.

Case in point: "Oomph!" Harry walked right into a dresser, whose magical aura was just the same as everything else around it; jack squat.

Slowly, and getting a bruise or two along the way, Harry ascended the stairs and found a little spot to hide in and wait. Eventually, Bellatrix would have to leave her room, where he knew his possessions were being kept. His wand, being magical in nature (as well as his potions ingredients and whatnot) had an aura as well. While faint, he could see it.

He waited. Hours passed, and Bellatrix finally dragged herself out of her room… without her bandages on. Harry smirked, admiring his mother's handiwork as Bellatrix tried to replace the bandages onto her face, careful not to disturb the healing-salve she had placed on her burnt face. Her lips were crusty slits around her mouth, and her nostrils were almost melted shut. Her ears were barely discernable from the burnt mess of flesh and skin that was her head. After finally completely covering her face, Bellatrix pulled out her wand and snapped a finger.

There was a 'pop!' and a small, wrinkled creature appeared next to her. It was a house elf, a very old one, with white hair in his ears and his long nose wrinkled.

"Yes, Mistress Bella?" asked the elf eagerly. Bellatrix faced the house elf.

"Kreacher, we are searching for the mudblood cretin again today. If you find him, don't hesitate to bring him down, and bring him to me." Beneath her bandages, she grinned. "Then we'll have some, ah, _fun_."

Giddily, Kreacher skipped down the stairs in search of Harry, followed by Bellatrix, who was humming a tune that sounded more like a funeral march than a light-hearted song.

Once they were gone, Harry looked over Bellatrix's room. There were no wards as far as he could tell (which was a lot), so he slowly made his way towards the door. Slowly, he cracked it open and slipped inside… only to receive a shower of marbles and other objects falling on his head.

"Fuck."

Bellatrix deserved more credit than he had given her; she hadn't ignored the option of using simple traps and security measures. The ruckus he had made could probably be heard all the way downstairs.

He had to work fast.

Harry dashed towards the trunk and wand, which were his own, and just as quickly fled the room. He didn't have time to watch out for Bellatrix: In her state of injury, he was certain that she wouldn't be able to make it up the stairs in time to catch him.

After several minutes of running silently (a talent he'd picked up during his years at the Dursleys), Harry turned into a room and locked the door. He leaned against a wall, slid down, and caught his breath.

He'd made it… for now.

THUMP

Harry jerked away from his trunk, which had returned to its original size.

THUMP

While muffled, it was loud enough for Harry to hear. He hoped Bellatrix wouldn't be able to hear it.

THUMP

The trunk door flew open, and Harry felt something impact with his chest. Winded, he looked down.

It was The Book… the book he hadn't been able to open in months. And it was glowing. His right eye felt warm, and the book floated into the air. It looked different…

Etched on the cover was the image of a serpent biting its own tail, the Ouroboros, with two ravens perched on its scaly hide, and with an eye carried within the serpent's bosom…

The book opened, much to Harry's sock, and the world around him fell into blackness…

**(1)**: No, I am not regurgitating CoS's plot. If anything, Lockhart is there for comic relief and to fill in the DADA position.

**(2)** Alright, concerning wandless magic: Basically, it's just manipulating your magic without a wand. Now, anything uber-complicated (like a stunner or throwing fire) would require a wand. However, pushes, gusts of wind, etc, do not require a wand as long as you can manipulate your aura even a little bit.

**(3)**: Oh, snap.

Ugh, I can't say I'm happy with Hermione's conflict with Neville... I rewrote the thing three times, and that's the best I've got so far. :(


	10. ZOMG Fake Chapter 10

Hary lookd at his frends and shouted "HAY GUYZ LETS GO 'N GET SUM CHOCOLATE"

Hermonie said "ok' and Neville hugged hary cuz he likd choclet vry much

Giny wuz in the cornr givng Snap a handjobe wile beeing buttsecksd buy voldmort, but he dide of stds and teh wurld wuz savd.

Teh end

an

plz revue zomg


	11. Master O REAL CHAPTER TEN

Hello again, ladies, gentlemen, and sentient disgusting-mass-of-rotting-flesh-and-crudely-sewn-together-cadavers. Well, here's the next chapter… in other news, I am now attempting to become ambidextrous. O: Yes, I am going to be manipulating the mouse (among other things) with my left hand. Ph33r.

Also, sorry about my 'April Fool's' Chapter Ten… it was 6 AM, I was sleep-deprived, and I couldn't resist. Yes, it was an April Fool's Day prank. Geez… For those of you who saw my little joke for what it was, you get a cookie.

URGENT: Relative to its hits, the fake chapter got the most reviews out of any... Scratch that, the most reviews out of any period. O.o WHAT THE FUCK?

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Ten: Master O**_

Harry felt an overwhelming sense of vertigo as the floor disappeared, and he fell backwards. The walls of the room were torn apart in a maelstrom of colors and light, like a flock of birds hastily fleeing from a disturbed pond. There was no wind going through his hair or into his ears… he was just falling. He tried to breath, and found that he couldn't.

He twitched in mid-fall.

The cry of pain died in his throat as he felt a splitting headache dominate his skull, as if his forehead were being torn open by a drunken butcher. His eyes widened considerably, and his back arched, as a myriad of images assaulted his mind. Harry saw flashes of… something… He smelled, which should have been impossible due to the lack of any air, blood… he smelled smoke… he smelled death… he smelled rage…

'Can you smell rage?'

There was a flash of imagery; flames; black, furious, all-consuming flames that could only emanate from the very core of the underworld.

A battle cry of a thousand warriors roared in his ear, screaming for blood and victory… victory, or death.

Two swords clanged against each other, sending angry sparks into the air around them.

A hail of arrows flew into the air, blotting out the sun, and formed a barrage falling down upon a horde of warriors, shields raised in defense.

Opposing battalions of epic proportions charged at each other.

A wolf leapt at its prey, sinking his fangs into its neck, and his brethren joined in the assault.

A serpent struck his own prey.

A man ducked below the swing of a sword, and drove his own weapon into his opponent's chest.

'What's going on?'

Violet light pulsed from a rod, and shot out at unfathomable speeds towards a massive beast.

A sword carved into a neck.

'Why am I seeing this?'

Blood splattered across a rock.

'What does it mean?'

Wind tore through an armored behemoth, rendering him only bloody dust to be blown away by the gales.

'WHAT'S GOING ON?'

"Ah, so you've finally opened it."

Harry opened his eyes, feeling exhausted. He weakly raised his head, and was greeted by an old man sitting in front of him, backside resting upon his trunk. The man was indeed ancient, certainly enough to give even Dumbledore a run for his money. His gray beard was so long it touched the ground as he sat, and he held himself with a hunched-over posture and leant on a twisted walking-stick that could've been a dead branch or a piece of drift wood. His eyes, if they were there, were not visible beneath the strip of black cloth over his marred and wrinkled face. He was dressed simply; in old-fashioned robes that looked liked they'd withstood a fair share of the elements.

"What's the matter? Has that little encounter robbed you of your ability to speak?" he asked good naturedly, indulging in a chuckle. Harry sat up straight, rubbing his head in pain.

"What was that?" asked Harry in a daze. He held his hand in front of his face, trying to count how many fingers he had… they were so blurry.

"Do take off those blasted things, child," said the man. "You won't be needing them anymore." He raised his hand, and Harry's glasses flew into his awaiting palm. Harry's eyes widened. The man chuckled. "Don't look so shocked, child. Such simple acts can be done easily without external aide." He pointed at Harry's wand, which was being tightly clutched. "I must say, that is quite an instrument you have there; what make is it? Vulcan?"

Harry shook his head. "Ollivander's…" he said, starting to wake up a bit more.

"Ah… I'd just recently heard of him, but I've never seen his work in person. I suppose it comes as no surprise; I've been trapped in that blasted book for who knows how long," said the man, stroking his beard. He looked over Harry appraisingly, as if he were analyzing a scientific specimen.

Harry stood and twisted his head from side to side, working out kinks in his neck. He froze, stiffened, and then pointed his wand readily at the old man. The old man looked amused, and smiled.

"How could you even see my wand? Or know that I would wake up?" he asked. "And what in the bloody hell happened to me?"

"There are more ways to see than with your eyes, Mr. Potter," said the old man mysteriously, his voice a mere whisper. He smiled congenially. "As for what 'in the bloody hell happened' to you… Well, just sit down for but a moment and I will explain." Whatever the old man was going to say would have to wait, for at that moment a loud bashing sound was heard.

Harry's head jerked towards the door to the room. It had to be Bellatrix… she must've heard the commotion and come running. He heard the muffled shriek of an incantation, and a part of the door exploded. Bellatrix peaked inside, a mad grin on her scorched face.

"Heeeere's BELLA!" she yelled with glee.

'…I wonder if she realizes she just imitated a muggle movie…' Harry wondered idly. He shook his head, and raised his wand in her direction.

"Bye now!" Harry sent a banishing charm her way, and she flew backwards and into the opposite wall. As she was knocked unconscious for the moment, Harry turned back to the old man.

All that was there was his trunk.

Harry grabbed his trunk, shrunk it, and exited the room in a rush.

"Damn," spat Harry. Bellatrix stood up, her wand in hand.

"You can't get rid of me that easily, _Potter_," she said with equal venom. "Try and banish this!" Bellatrix sent a shot of pink light at Harry, who ducked beneath it. The wall behind him was struck, and quickly began melting. The amorphous goop started leaking on the floor, even burning through it.

Harry countered with a severing curse at her ankles, but she managed to jump above the invisible strip of magic. The wall behind her received a deep gash. Bellatrix fired a stunner, and then surrounded herself with levitating items from throughout the hallway. Harry blocked the stunner with little difficulty, and then sent a barrage of minor hexes and jinxes at the de facto shield that was surrounding Bellatrix.

"Don't wear yourself out too much now, boy," she said. She grinned. "I'm feeling better than ever this particular morning… ripping you to shreds would be child's play. Ha! Child's play, playing with a child!" She cackled at her own joke.

Harry snorted, and conjured a tongue of flames, sending the stream of destructive magic at Bellatrix's wall. The more flammable objects, such as books and wooden stools, immediately lit up like torches. Bellatrix was now encased in a wall of fire.

Panting, Harry ran down the hallway with his arms hung limply at his sides. Whatever had happened earlier – which would be explained by the old man later, Harry knew that the old blighter knew – had royally wiped him out. Harry needed to conserve his magic… if he used too much, he'd probably slip into a coma as his body over-compensated to replenish his magical reserves. His body was using what nutrients he had consumed to not only feed his starving and growing body, but to also refuel his magic.

'Bloody muggles don't know how good they've got it,' Harry thought. Their bodies only had to worry about one thing to do with what nutrients they consumed. Statistically, muggles could live a week longer than the average wizard without food. Wizards eventually fell into a coma and their bodies were consumed to make magical power. That was why wizards ate such hardy and large meals… except for the French. They were weird.

After going down two flights of stairs, through five rooms and three corridors, and up _three_ flights of stairs, all the while leaving behind obstacles in the form of fallen furniture, puddles of conjured oil, and magic trip lines, Harry finally found haven in what appeared to be an attic. The room was, of course, filled with dust, and everything was covered in off-white sheets. Harry closed the door, locked it, and even pushed several pieces of furniture in front of it before relaxing.

"My-my, a very good show you put on there, child," said a cheery voice. Harry sprung to his feet and fired a hex in the direction of the voice.

The old man had appeared again, and chuckled as the jet of light stopped in mid-air before him. He tapped it with a finger, and the light dissipated into oblivion. He stroked his beard, smiling in amusement.

"If it were anyone but you," he said, "I'd be insulted that they thought such a simple spell could overwhelm me. Really, a wave of swirling kinetic energy? Useful in some situations, I suppose, but I'd hardly call that a spell for a real battle."

Harry's eyes narrowed and he kept his wand steadily trained on the mysterious old man.

"Who are you?" he asked. The old man smiled kindly, scratching the side of his face.

"Interesting question…" he murmured. "Who am I? I suppose you may call me Master O." The elderly wizard (Harry assumed he was a wizard) stood and took a bow. Harry paid no notice, and kept his steely gaze locked on the old man, incantations already forming in his mind.

The man quirked an eyebrow and his smile deepened.

"A puncturing charm to my lungs, eh? Always at the ready, I see," he said to Harry, as if he were grading him for a school project. Harry gritted his teeth. Despite his months of practicing occlumency, this man before him had managed to infiltrate his mind with no difficulty whatsoever. Harry hadn't even felt his presence. Master O smiled benignly. "Oh, don't worry, child. You have mounds of potential… you just need a bit of a guiding hand to help refine that potential."

Harry's eyes locked with Master O's.

"…what are you proposing?" Harry asked, with his voice steely and clear. The man sat back, stroking his beard thoughtfully. "What, do you want me to your apprentice or something?" The man chuckled.

"I suppose you could call it that," said the man. "Ultimately, you would be teaching yourself… I would just be teaching you basics, although nowadays I doubt they could be considered 'basic' at all, and you would build off of that. Magic tends to work more efficiently when a person uses spells that they make themselves."

Harry's arm was getting tired, but he didn't lower it.

"…what are you, anyway? Where did you come from?" asked Harry. Master O's smile never wavered.

"I am a magical construct modeled after a long deceased wizard who made me and sealed me within a magical book so that I may teach future generations, provided they can get me out in the first place," he explained in one breath. "Your first test was the eye… had you not been worthy of teaching, the eye would have killed you. I would have come out of the book sooner, but Bellatrix's interference lead to complications. As for how I actually came into being, the book is like an anchor for me to this world, and I am projecting myself out from the book."

Harry blinked at the blunt, skin-and-bones explanation.

"Oh, okay."

(AN: That was supposed to be about it for this chapter… AND THAT IS COMPLETELY UNNACCAPTABLE. I want to break at least 60kilotbites with this chapter, like usual. I shall now use the remainder of this chapter for something that is severely lacking: Character development/screen time for Hermione, Su, Neville, and Malfoy)

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

It was a fine day for Neville Longbottom, The Boy Who Lived, Epitome of Gryffindor, and Champion of the Wizarding World. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, he was breezing through his classes thanks to his Grandfather's training over the summer as well as past few years, and best of all…

Harry Potter was not there.

Harry Potter, Slytherin, and bitter enemy (In Neville's eyes, at least), was not at Hogwarts. Now, Neville didn't hate Harry… he just didn't like him. Hatred was dark and evil, and Neville wasn't, so he really didn't hate anything. He just disliked some thing very, _very_, much; namely darkness, evil, and Slytherins… Harry Potter, under Neville's impression, happened to fit into all of these categories.

Neville had meant what he said to Hermione not too long ago; Potter was nothing but trouble. True, he didn't actually believe him to be a weakling. In fact, the young celebrity saw Potter as one of his greatest rivals. What was most frustrating was that Neville knew almost nothing of his powers. Sure, he saw Potter's handiwork on the troll, but that really wasn't much. Just staring into the eyes of the boy told Neville that there was more going on in that wild-haired head than most people realized…

"What does he want?" Neville murmured to himself as he jogged around the grounds. Ever since he was old enough, Dumbledore had had Neville go through a strict workout and training routine… In the mornings he would run and work out, the go to regular school, and then go through personal training with Dumbledore or one of the professors if he was not available.

'Is he going to be like Voldemort?' thought Neville. His face hardened, and he began jogging at a stronger pace. 'If so… I'll be there to stop him in his tracks. I won't let there be anymore children like me if I can help it.' His resolve strengthened and now like steal, Neville continued jogging with a newfound vigor. Nothing would stand in his way of serving the Wizarding World's people and defending it…

Nothing… not even his own stinking fear of failure.

After finishing his run, and running a cleansing Charm over himself, Neville went off to the great hall for some breakfast. He put on his robes which he had hidden just outside the castle, and entered the Great Hall looking as fresh as a daisy. Seeing Ron at the Gryffindor Table waving him over, Neville walked along the aisle between the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor table before taking a seat, not too far from a certain sleeping Ravenclaw.

"Erm… Su?" asked Hermione. She poked the half-Chinese/Scottish girl with her wand, attempting to draw out a reaction from the lethargic witch. Su didn't budge, snoring into her morning bacon. After their friendship had deepened, Hermione had begun eating with Su at the Ravenclaw table. This proved to be a blessing (when Su wasn't in the situation she was in right now… unfortunately that happened a lot), as the Gryffindors dislike Hermione for the most part, and Neville and Ron always looked at her as if she were infected with a disease or something.

"Wuzzat?" asked Su sleepily, raising her head. Hermione sprayed a jet of water in her face, waking the girl up further. "I'm up, I'm up!" she cried.

"Honestly, Su, when did you go to sleep last night?" asked the Gryffindor 'Black Sheep' exasperatedly. Su sat up straighter, turning his stiff neck, popping her back, and stretching.

"Umm… when I sat down to eat my bacon," she said sheepishly, blushing. "I was up all night practicing spells…" She ate a piece of bacon, pointedly ignoring Hermione's shocked, and somewhat jealous, look. "…what?"

"You… y-you," sputtered Hermione. "Bloody hell, you're just like Harry!"

Two significant things just happened, ladies and gentlemen. One, Hermione said a curse word, and two, she just compared the rather meek and timid Su Li to Harry Potter. A wizard who was very powerful for his age, admired by few (in secret, mostly), and scorned by many.

"I am?" asked Su. "What do you mean?" Hermione sighed, sipping her pumpkin juice.

"Well, the both of you don't talk much and you both work ours into the night practicing magic… I just study and go to sleep," said Hermione in a deflated manner. She was oblivious as Su ravenously began consumption of any food in reach of her swift hands. After finishing, Su gave a nearly imperceptible belch (she just barely heard it), and gave a sigh of content.

"If it bothers you so much, we could study together at night," suggested Su tentatively, fingering her silver wear. "There's an empty classroom on the Second Floor that we can both get too," she continued. Hermione's eyes widened, and she shook her head furiously.

"No, we can't be caught out of bounds at night!" she practically screeched. Luckily, nobody paid enough attention to hear her. "And I can't practice magic in the tower… I'd wake Lavender and Parvati up, and they're nasty when they don't get their 'beauty' sleep. Practicing in the common room… I imagine Longbottom would notice and tell me to stop. He's practically a prefect, all the privileges he gets from Dumbledore!" she exclaimed.

It was true. Along with Neville's fame, he also got all the powers of any prefect concerning the school. Hermione reasoned that Dumbledore trusted his pseudo-grandson enough to use such power wisely and observe responsibility… and for the most part, he did. Key-word: Most part. He'd sometimes take off points or give detention for the littlest things, and kept Gryffindor such a tight-ship that many of them were considering requesting a house switch.

The bushy-haired girl looked down at her companion, who had once again fallen asleep.

Hermione sighed, checking her watch. Her Charm's class would be starting in seven minutes, and Su would have to get to Potions. Hermione tapped her wand on Su's head, sending a pulse of cold through her skin. The girl sat bolt-upright at the stimulation.

"Oh…" she said, blinking the tiredness from her eyes. "Thanks… bye for now." Su, still half-asleep somewhat, grabbed her back and made her way down to the dungeons, her feet knowing where to go by sheer habit.

As she continued walking, stilling a strange twilight between dream and reality, Su bumped into a large, squishy wall. Bouncing backwards, Su looked up and gulped.

He was a massive Slytherin boy… Goyle, if she remembered his name correctly. His fellow crony, Crabbe, and his leader Malfoy joined him in staring down at Su in distaste. Well… she thought it was distaste on the former two. It could've been constipation, but she was pretty sure it was distaste.

"What do we have here?" asked Malfoy rhetorically. "A little mudblood Ravenclaw, bumping into my friends, and no apology? How… unbecoming," he said, a pointy smirk forming on his face. He pulled out his wand.

Su became very aware of the fact that she was alone in this corridor, save for the less than enjoyable company of three certain Slytherin boys.

"I think we should teach her some manners, don't you agree?" he asked nonchalantly. Crabbe and Goyle nodded dumbly, pulling out their own wands. Su gulped, trying to retreat, but found that the three of them had backed her against a wall.

Panicking a little, Su grabbed her own wand and held it in front of her, shaking like an earthquake was running through her.

"Leave me alone! I'm sorry!" she said, her voice only just barely trembling. Malfoy smiled, and Su thought for a moment that he'd let her go and just be an ass about it… she was wrong.

"You still need to learn your place, mutt," said Malfoy. He waved his wand, saying, "_Petrificus Totalus!_"

A jet of yellow light shot at Su, but luckily she managed to duck under it.

Lost in a wave of adrenaline, Su acted without much thought;

With a flick of her wand, the stony floor beneath her rumbled, sending Malfoy and his goons flying across the corridor. Luckily, they all managed to hit the wall softly, cushioned by Crabbe and Goyle's combined fat with Malfoy in between.

Panting, Su picked up her book-bag again and made a break for it so she would not be late for class. She had been late once before… and it had not been pleasant. Snape was a cruel, unforgiving man…

'As is my room-mate,' thought Su in a tone somewhere between ruefulness and barely contained indignant rage.

Meanwhile, Malfoy and his cronies were laying all over each other in a rather, _ahem_, awkward position.

Trying to get up, Malfoy was blinded by a powerful, obscenely bright flash of a camera. He fell back again, shielding his eyes from the bright light. Blinking rapidly, he just caught site of a short, fleeing first year with a camera around his neck and mousy brown hair on his head. He turned the corner just as Malfoy managed to fully stand up with his soon-to-be-known-as-'Very-Good-Friends.'

"Get back here, you little mudblood!" shouted Malfoy loudly, sending jets of light down the corridor. But it was too late… the boy was gone.

Malfoy sighed, and looked at his watch.

"Let's go, Crabbe, Goyle," he said. "We only have a few minutes left to get to class…"

"What about the pictures?" asked Goyle, pointing down the hallway. Malfoy just 'tch'd.'

"We'll be pointed and laughed at for little more or less than a fortnight, and then everyone will forget about it," said Malfoy with confidence. "After all, I'm Draco Malfoy… they know better than to mess with me for too long." He scowled, and began stalking towards the Potion's lab, Crabbe and Goyle in tow.

'Idiot Gryffindor,' thought Malfoy nastily, his face betraying now emotion. 'He will get what is coming to him… that is for certain. Nobody makes a fool of Draco Malfoy and gets away with it.'

Hours passed, as did classes, and Malfoy soon once again found himself in the Great Hall, eating lunch while listening to the other Slytherins chatter on about homework, the latest rumors, how he was gay, how useless—Wait, back up.

"Yeah, they were all over each other!" whispered a new first year to her friend, who giggled while looking at Malfoy and his cronies. Malfoy gritted his teeth, but said nothing. Reacting angrily would only worsen the situation. He looked to his right.

'It is the lesser of two evils,' thought Malfoy dryly.

"Pansy," he said warmly, his eyes locked with the pug-faced Slytherin's. "I was wondering; would you like to join me in the library later today for some, ah, _studying_?" he asked.

The rumors ceased, although the talking didn't, and now Malfoy had but one problem; an ecstatic schoolgirl who looked like she was ready to wrap him up and take him home to her parents for the wedding.

He gave a soundless release of his breath.

'Oh well,' he thought. 'Reputation salvaged…'

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Harry sat against the wall, eating some chocolate frogs that were left over from last year that had been in his trunk. They were a bit stale, and their jumps had become more like twitches, but the treats were tasty nonetheless.

"So," asked Harry, "what exactly are we going to do?"

Master O just continued smiling, going through the book that was his apparent anchor to this plane of existence.

"Worry not, child," said Master O. "In but a moment, I shall begin the _second test_." Harry raised a dark eyebrow in confusion, but said nothing. After a few moments of searching, the elderly wizard exclaimed, "Aha! I've found it!"

Still silent, Harry merely stood and tilted his head, wand in hand. Master O continued to smile, his eyebrows rising above his head-band covering his eyes.

"Are you ready?" he asked. Harry looked thoughtful for a moment, his steely red and green gaze focused on the book in Master O's hands.

"That's a trick question, isn't it?" asked Harry, flipping his wand around in his hands. He was met with a booming laugh from Master O, who haphazardly through the book into the air.

The entire room was filled with a twisting gale of wind blowing at impossible speeds, and the book began to be torn apart in the wind… as was Master O.

"_This won't be like most exams, Harry!_" said the man's voice, sounding close and far away at the same time as his body disappeared into the wind and scattered pages filling the room. "_But don't give up! If you pass, you may even learn something!_"

Harry lifted a hand, shielding his face from flying pages of the book as the entire world around him turned into that yellow parchment color. Smells, sounds, sight… it all became useless in the torrent of parchment.

And then, just as it started, it stopped.

Harry turned, surrounded by darkness, an ominous feeling filling his body and shaking him to the very core. Oddly… he did not find himself to be scared or even a little nervous.

Harry grinned maniacally.

"I'm… excited."


	12. Fun and Games My Ass

AN: Yeah, sorry about the wait. I've been sick, which sucks. u.u

I just saw Grindhouse on Saturday. I saw shooting, explosions, and boobies. It was epic.

_A Nameless Heretic Production_

_**Crimson**_

_**Chapter Eleven: Fun and Games… My Ass**_

Harry gripped his wand tightly, his eyes, green and red, surveying his surroundings. The room itself had remained unchanged, for the most part at least. However… it _felt_ different. It was subtle, a sort of pressure on Harry's body trying to consume him. The magically illuminated chandelier, which had once shed light upon the entire room, now simply emanated an ominous red glow. The darkness around Harry seemed to stir. He sniffed the air, trying to discern yet more differences.

There was a scratching sound to his right.

"_Flipendo_," grunted Harry. The blue orb of light shot from his wand, and Harry saw it briefly as the ballistic magic struck: It was a fairly large, humanoid creature. It growled from the darkness, and slowly approached Harry. He heard drops of liquid, probably the beast's drool, impact upon the wooden floor.

Wasting no time, Harry continued his assault with more projectile spells. He heard a fair few strike their target, but soon his adversary began to dodge the incoming streaks of light. The beast stuck to his territory, and Harry could not see it at all without the aide of the light given off by his spells.

Harry struck his wand above his head with a short wave, and suddenly the entire room was bathed in a blinding light. It only lasted a second… but it was long enough.

He still didn't know exactly where the beast was, but that didn't matter now. The young wizard was completely surrounded by the beasts. They all stood, snarling, and he heard and felt the tremors as they leapt from their positions. Acting quickly, Harry transfigured the floor below him into a dome to act as a temporary shield. It wouldn't last long, but like the light, it would last long enough. Harry began a long series of wand movements.

As a claw struck through the wood, cutting a thin red line into Harry's cheek, and smirked and finished the wand movement.

"Bang," he whispered. Instantly, he was surrounding by a maelstrom of blue-white energy, originating from the tip of his wand. Its mass increased, as did it's motion, and Harry wore a satisfied smirk as his curse tore the limbs off of the most nearby beats, sending them flying against their kin and into the walls and ceiling. He had taken out roughly seventy-three percent of the mob, if his calculations were correct.

Now with the beasts in range of the chandelier's rays, Harry ducked under a claw, and side-stepped another strike. He gritted his teeth as a claw managed to cut him in his side: These bastards were a hell of a lot faster than his cousin and his goons.

Harry sent a severing curse at one of the beasts, giving him a matching gash as retribution of Harry's injury, and the wizard then conjured a jet of flame towards one of the monster's kinsmen. The beast howled and writhed wildly, hitting some of his allies and setting them aflame as well.

Satisfied that he had caused a decent amount of unrest among the ranks of his opponents, Harry jutted his wand towards the door, muttering '_Ambulo ad door!_" Harry was instantly pulled towards the exit through magic, his person going straight through the few remaining beasts. He tore the door open, went through, and closed it in one fluid motion. Tapping the door with his wand, Harry muttered a series of words, and the door gave off a glow. It was sealed… for now.

It was best for him to flee the scene as soon as possible.

Harry took a deep breath, and began to tentatively walk down the corridor… who knew what sort of horrors 'Master O' had conjured for him to fight off. Was this all an illusion, or were Master O and The Book as powerful as they seemed? The gash in his side felt real enough… Harry poked it with a healing charm, and it closed up leaving a scar along where the gash had once been.

With his wounds out of the way, Harry surveyed his surroundings. It seemed safe enough… which just made him worry even more. Closing his left eye, Harry's vision shifted from the light spectrum to a magical one: He didn't like what he saw.

Magic… it was everywhere. And it didn't look too friendly. One particular tongue of orange light happened to be heading towards him at a rather fast rate. Snapping his other eye open, Harry just barely saw an incoming length of carpet coming towards him. Biting back curse, Harry ducked below it, and rolled out of the way as the rug attempted to bind him to the floor.

Like a serpent, the irate length of carpeting rose from the ground and reared its 'head,' preparing to strike at Harry once again. The wizard didn't give it a chance, and conjured several stakes and banished them at the carpet, pinning it to the ground.

Harry turned around, only to be met with a powerful strike to the face and a moderate case of rug-burn.

'Of course… the _other_ end,' he thought. Recovering from the blow, Harry hurled himself away from the carpet's next strike and pinned it to the ground in the same fashion as its other end. Just for good measure, Harry did the same with various other points of the carpet, thus leaving it immobilized and secured to the wooden floorboards of the corridor… and just for the hell of it, he set the thing on fire.

"_You seem to be having a good time_," said a voice. Harry whirled around, his wand at the ready. There was nobody around. "_Ah, you won't find me just yet, young one._" It was Master O. "_Aren't you glad you have that eye of yours? I'm sure it will come in handy_."

"Where are you, old man?" asked Harry. There was no answer. "Fuck… bastard."

Satisfied that he had eliminated any threats in the corridor, Harry moved on. He had no particular direction in mind… he was really just walking as naturally as possible. He felt that the magic from 'The Book,' which had evidently taken over the Black Manor, was guiding him to its source. That, and whenever he tried to pinpoint The Book's magical aura, he encountered two problems: One, he didn't know what The Book's aura even looked like, and two, there was so much magic in the environment he doubted if he could see it even if he wanted to.

Upon exiting the corridor (after managing to tear his eyes away from the writhing, burning carpet) Harry found himself standing atop a stair case… a very large stair case.

To be absolutely precise, it was a very large staircase with two large, menacing yellow eyes, razor sharp teeth that were bigger than his arm, and slightly-glowing drool dripping from its maw. Harry was fairly certain that the drool held more bacteria and other such harmful substances to wipe out a population of Dragons with just one bucket full in their water supply.

"Can I walk down?" Harry asked the staircase.

It replied with a roar and Harry ducked under a shot of spittle roughly the sizes of his head. He took that as a 'no.'

Conjuring a large steel wall in front of him, Harry's jaw tightened as he began forming multiple scenarios and methods on how to deal with his latest adversary… It was large, poisonous, and had big teeth.

'What to do?' thought Harry. His thoughts were interrupted by a melting sound, and Harry saw that the steel wall he had conjured was melting rapidly. '...cool…'

His instincts blaring at him in alarm, Harry through himself to the side and narrowly avoided being manually-transfigured into paste as the demonic staircase launched its heavily shielded head at the wall, smashing into it. Harry, figuring the beast was at least stunned, made a break for the scaly-steps to descend to a lower level. Unfortunately, the steps flexed and writhed beneath his feet, sending him flying through the air.

The beast's eyes locked onto his sailing body, and Harry put up a shield that caused incoming saliva to roll away to either side of him. He followed with several curses at the monster's face, and managed to score a conjunctivitis curse in its left eye. Partially blinded, the beast roared in anger and struck.

Harry corkscrewed in midair, and pulled himself above the beat's snapping jaws using an above chandelier as leverage (he had 'grabbed' it with a relatively simple spell). The beast stopped, realizing he had missed, and Harry managed to land on top of his head. Digging his fingers into its hide, Harry held on as hard as he could as it began jerking around like a bronco at a rodeo.

Experimentally, Harry fired a stream of flames behind him and at the beast's lower back. It did nothing, except to irritate the monster even more, if the beast's increased movements were any indication. Harry looked down, and saw that his steel wall was still somewhat in existence… it was now a large, jagged ring of metal.

'Jackpot.'

"ACCIO STEEL!" shouted Harry… pointing his wand through his ride's skull. The steel wall's remains shot up, its jagged edges bending upward from the spell's force, and dug themselves into the beast's soft under-jaw. A gurgled screech came from the monster, and Harry noticed that its movements were slowing. To add an extra bit of kick, Harry grabbed onto the chandelier, and sent a bolt of lightning at the steel wall's remains.

The beast was fried from the inside.

Hanging from his position at the chandelier, Harry watched as the monster fell onto the ground, causing a tremor to echo throughout the room. He let go of the chandelier, and slowed his descent with a wave of his wand. Upon landing on the ground, Harry took no time to admire his handiwork as he bolted down the now inert staircase. He didn't want to risk the beast coming back to life while he was still there.

It was only a few moments before he found the end of the staircase, and Harry stopped, looking at a large, ornately decorated set of double-doors. They stood tall, almost Hagrid's height, and were rather classy looking. It looked like the front doors to a private party that no waif would ever be invited to. Harry, dressed only in a bloody t-shirt, jeans, and running shoes, stepped inside.

His eyes were met with white… a lot of white. It was a ballroom, and a large one at that. It was easily the size of the Great Hall at Hogwarts, and possibly just as inhabited. Men and women, dressed in predominantly white dress robes and gowns, were waltzing throughout the room, seemingly oblivious to the scruffy intruder.

It looked like a perfectly normal, well meaning ball at a first glance. There were drinks and finger-foods at the tables, and the people danced and socialized as normal. The entire effect was ruined by the fact that they were all covered in blood. It soaked parts of their otherwise impeccable apparel, giving them the visage of a swarm of butchers – Dancing butchers, with bow ties and frills.

Harry idly stored away the image for future use in a B-movie, if he ever entered the industry.

Not knowing what else to do, Harry experimentally stepped forward. Nothing happened.

He took another step forward… nothing.

Harry took one more step. All hell broke loose.

His senses blaring at him, Harry ducked under an incoming blade. One of the 'women' dancing had fluidly come into range, twirled, and her hand was replaced with an elegant cleaver. She continued her assault, and was soon joined by everyone else in range. It was like a bizarre, gothic dance as they all attempted to shred him to pieces with their dance-like attacks. It was all Harry could do to avoid being seriously wounded, but he soon enough sported many cuts and gashes all over his body.

Harry sent a shockwave of magic around him, pushing away his assailants in a flash of warped light. He made a break for the opposite double-doors from the entrance; however his adversaries proved to be terrifyingly quicker than he was. They swarmed around the door, and advanced towards him, all the while participating in the deadly dance in an effort to claim his life.

"Hello, Mr. Potter," said Master O as he appeared abruptly. He stood next to Harry, dressed in a white tuxedo and had a martini in hand.

"Wha…? Oh, hey. When'd you get here?" asked the boy as if nothing were out of the ordinary, shooting a freeze-'n-shatter curse at nearby ballroom dancers. A woman in an overly frilly dress exploded in a shroud of ice crystals.

"Oh, just now," said the old man benignly. He chugged the last of his martini and tossed the glass over his shoulder. "Having fun?" he asked, backing away to give Harry more room as the dancers closed in.

He ducked under another blade, planted his foot on the dancer's chest, and flung himself away from incoming strikes. Harry attempted to transfigure the terrain to interrupt their advance, but they managed to get through it without difficulty, simply dancing around stalagmites or jumping over less simple obstructions.

"Yes, actually," said Harry. "I haven't had my blood pumping like this since the troll." Harry sent a wide crescent of light shoot forward, bisecting several incoming dancers. Master O chuckled good-naturedly, observing his 'student.'

"I am glad to hear that, child," said the man. His walking-stick appeared in his hand once again, and he leaned on it with his head tilted to once side. His eyebrows rose in alarm after a moment, and he whistled lowly. "Oh dear…" He disappeared with a 'pop.'

Harry adopted a quizzical expression, and soon replaced it with a grimace as he noticed that his adversaries were increasing in speed. They were now advancing towards him with reckless abandon, and they managed to deflect the bulk of his assault with their bladed limbs. Harry jumped over a low-blow from a nearby man in blood-stained dress robes, and then conjured a shield to block a high-blow from another dancer. The force of the strike sent him flying into the horde, and he now found himself surrounded by blades, limbs, and enemies.

Perfect.

Harry somersaulted on his way down, stood up on the last rotation, and then spun around after a quick wand-movement. A sphere of purple flames gushed from around him, incinerating the closest dancers, and blowing away the farthest. He had managed to take out roughly one fourth of the populace in the ball room, and they were now spread in a circle around him. Enraged, they renewed their assault and charged at him, their blades growing longer, more curved, and more sadistic looking.

Due to the loss of numbers, and the sudden increase in density, there was quite a bit of room near the double doors that were Harry's new destination. Just before the nearest dancers could strike, Harry flicked his wand towards a high-up chandelier (There were a lot of them in the mansion, evidently), and he ascended above the clashing blades, just getting a shallow cut in his calf.

After reaching the chandelier, Harry then pulled himself towards the double-doors, narrowly avoiding more strikes as he sailed through the air. He corkscrewed, saving his left arm, and drew his legs to his chest and spared his right foot from an untimely amputation. He managed to land at the double-doors, and flung them open. His adrenaline was still pounding through his system.

Next thing he knew, the doors were closed. He was on the other side.

He was 'safe.'

Suddenly loosing all strength in his legs, Harry sunk to the floor. His breathing began to slow, and his eyes lazily surveyed his new location. It looked like another corridor, but much smaller; more like a sort of foyer. There was a staircase to his right, another set of double doors straight across from him, and an even larger set of double doors down the stairs.

Harry's wounds were now beginning to take his toll. He weakly managed to heal them, but they all left scars, some worse than others. He felt his body shutting down; it needed rest. A stray thought crossed his mind.

'I wonder what everyone else is up to…' Harry's world then faded into oblivion.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

"MISS LI!" shouted McGonagall, slamming her deceptively frail looking hand on the desk. Su jerked awake, and rubbed her eyes. "May I ask as to why you were sleeping, young lady?" asked the professor. Su blushed, averting her eyes as her fellow students laughed.

"I didn't sleep much last night… I was reading," she said sheepishly.

"And what exactly were you reading?" asked McGonagall.

"Transfiguration book?" said Su hopefully. The elderly professor rolled her eyes, although Su detected a hint of amusement.

"Five points from Ravenclaw. Now," said McGonagall, "please catch up with your classmates and transfigure that toad into a goblet, if you would be so kind."

Su picked up her wand, shaking her head to further awaken herself. With a wave of her wand and a muttered incantation the toad before her transformed into an elegant but simple goblet. McGonagall smiled.

"Very good, Miss Li. There seems to be hope for you yet," she said. "And, it appears that you are one of the most successful at this particular exercise," she noted, looking around the room, trying not to look too disappointed in some of the more, ahem, 'imperfect' transfigurations. One particular goblet was covered in fur and had a rat's tale sticking out of it, even.

'Hmm… that could actually be rather useful, a nice novelty even,' thought Su idly.

"Five points to Ravenclaw," continued McGonagall. "Keep up the good work, Li, and try not to fall asleep in my class!" With that, McGonagall continued her rounds, giving her students various pointers and instructions.

"What were you _really _reading?" asked Hermione to Su's right. Su said nothing, staring pointedly at her goblet. "Come on Su, please?" whined the brunette.

Sighing, Su answered, "Fine, it was dueling tactics." Hermione smirked, pulling out a notebook and marking off another tally.

"That's the twenty-fourth thing you have in common with Harry!" she announced, putting away her notebook. Su groaned.

"So you say, 'Mione," she said. "And I still think that it's creepy how you said that we walked similarly." Su shuddered. Hermione rolled her eyes.

"I have good hearing, and I noticed that your foot-steps sounded just like Harry's, right down to the beat," she said. "I wonder what would happen if the two of you met…"

"I did meet him," said Su. "Well… sort of… he helped me out with the levitation charm." Su suddenly thought of something. "Do you have an obsessive crush on him or something?" She inched away. "You realize I'm not Harry, right?"

Hermione's reply was a swift smack to the back of Su's head.

"Hilarious," she said dryly. When among her own, Su could be quite a kidder. However, she still had issues with meeting other people… the last time Hermione had forced her to make conversation with some Ravenclaw third year, the poor girl hadn't been able to say anything and the boy thought she was having an asthma attack or something.

"Hey, Granger," said a boy. "Here's your essay, and yours, Li." He gave the girl's their papers, and continued on his way. Hermione looked down at her essay (ninety-eight out of one hundred), and then at Su's.

She had beaten Su by fifteen points. Grinning, Hermione put away her essay. Su's goblet may have been more elegant than hers, but Hermione always managed to leave Su in the dust when it came to theory.

Leaning back in her seat, Su looked up at the ceiling. She was bored. Very bored…

"Hey, Hermione," she said. The brunette looked at her. "Do you want to train in the Double-R after class? Dinner won't start for an hour or two, and we don't have any classes." Hermione shook her head.

"Su, we both have three essays to work on, and one of them is due tomorrow," she said. Su gave her a look. "Okay, I've already done that one, but what about you?"

"I can just do it tonight," said Su.

"But, if I recall correctly, you also have a test in Professor Lockhart's class tomorrow. You need to study!" said Hermione urgently.

Su gave a very un-ladylike snort. "As if that idiot's tests are actually worth anything," she grumbled. "Half of the questions are about what hair-care products he uses." The Chinese-Scottish girl had quite a sharp tongue as well when called for. Hermione blushed.

"Now, Su, Professor Lockhart is a reputed campaigner against the dark-side!" she said supportively. "You can't just criticize him like that. What did he ever do to you?"

"Other than teach us absolutely nothing useful?" asked Su scathingly. Hermione scowled a little bit, but said nothing. "That and – Never mind, whatever."

Hermione raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"It's nothing," said Su quickly. "I just can't stand the guy. Sometimes I wonder who was worse; Quirrel or him."

"Hmph," said Hermione.

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

_Drip_

_Drip_

_Drip_

_Large, emerald eyes opened on a small child's face. He stood. He was in a room… a kitchen of some sort. His vision was hazy, as if the area were filled with a thick fog. Or perhaps he was viewing it all through some sort of grainy film. There was little light, and everything was expressed in varying hues of gray. A window was creaked open, allowing a chilly breeze to invade the static room. It whistled as it passed through the narrow space between the window and the wall, but very lightly. _

_The child winced on reflex as something dripped onto his head. It was a cold liquid, whatever it was, and it was sinking into his hair. He felt it trail down his forehead, around his eye, along his nose, and past his lips. He licked. The liquid held a coppery, metallic taste… The child looked up._

_There, pinned to the ceiling, were bodies… Five bodies. _

_Five corpses. _

_Less than six cadavers, but more than four rotting remnants of life. _

_They hung from the ceiling, dark stakes driven into their bodies, securing them to the wooden surface. _

_One was a man with caked, messy hair, eyes carved out, and his face contorted into a grimace of horror held in place by haphazardly placed pins, mutilating his face. _

_Next to him lay another man with shorter, neater hair. His legs were missing, and stray sinew and tissue hung from his waist. His throat was torn out, liquid splattering his shirt. _

_Adjacent from them was a little girl, with long curly hair hanging from her bloody scalp. Her lower jaw was missing, her slightly buck front teeth all the more visible, and her tongue also hung as a toy to gravity. She was secured only by a single steak, driven through her abdomen. _

_Laid out above them was another body, if you could call it that. It had been torn to shreds. What was left of it seemed to be sewn together, like a gothic rag doll. _

_All of them were in shades of gray, just like the rest of the room. However, there was one difference… they were covered in _it_. He didn't quite yet know what _it_ was. It was red, he knew that. And if he was correct, it tasted metallic. It covered them, all over their bodies. It seeped from their wounds. The air stank of it. The boy felt sad now. _

_A dripping sound towards the door drew his attention. Slowly, he turned, his eyes focusing on the intruder. _

_A figure stood at the door. Long, wavy hair covered its face, as its head was hung downwards. It was dressed in a white night-gown, torn up and spotted and streaked with the strange red liquid. Its right hand was replaced with a gnarled, mutilated appendage. Perhaps it was once a hand. The child didn't know. _

_It stepped forward. _

_It was clumsy, whatever it was, and was obviously having difficulty walking. However, despite its apparent lameness, the child was terrified. What was this… beast? This monster? This mutilation of Homo sapiens? _

_He didn't know how long he had been lost in thought. It could have been seconds… or hours. However long it was, it was long enough for the creature to get within arm's length. The child heard it breathing. He felt it struggle to stay up. However, he mostly heard it breathing._

_In._

_Out._

_Inhale._

_Exhale._

_It groaned. _

_The child stepped back, but the creature stepped forward in turn. The child saw its hair… it was streaked with the red fluid. It was in knots and messy as well. He felt something staring at him from behind the scarlet curtain. It breathed more, but didn't move._

_Tentatively, he reached out. His small fingers were met with a stringy sensation as he touched the hair. He gulped. The child moved the hair aside to get a better look at the creature's face._

_He was met the sight of an angel; A sad, melancholy, mutilated, hurt, betrayed, deceived, murdered, savage, monstrous, enraged, terrified, terrifying, angry, hateful, angel. _

Harry James Potter's eyes flew open.

"Blood…" he said breathlessly, his throat and mouth dry as a desert. He took a deep, calming breath, and stood up.

Shaking his head, Harry surveyed his surroundings. He was still in the foyer, and if he was not mistaken, not dead.

A sudden scratching sound dissolved all future expectations of the concept of safety.

He looked down the stairs, and saw a very much restored Bellatrix Lestrange sitting on the hand-rail. She was running long, purple fingernails over the wood, her unmarred face a vision of leisure. In her other hand was her wand. She was dressed in a very Victorian outfit, a black gown with a corset that accentuated her bust. Her hair, now longer kept down by her bandages, was done up in an elegant design with her fringe framing her face, spaced out over her eye on one side, and a high ponytail in the back, kept together by silver pins.

"I see that you have awakened, Master **(1)** Potter," she purred. Her eyes opened, and her poisonous violet orbs zeroed in on him. "I've been waiting." She slid off of the rail, and slowly ascended the stairs, her eyes on him the whole way. Harry took a dueling stance, his wand out in front of him. There was something wrong, very wrong. Well, not necessarily wrong, on second thought. More so… it was _different_. Bellatrix was different, and not just physically. There was something else.

Soon enough, the dark witch reached him, bending down (and thus showing way too much cleavage to be legal), she looked at him in the face. A dark smirk formed on her full lips.

"Is there something wrong, child?" she asked, running her fingernails along his chin. Harry's eyes narrowed.

"What happened to you?" he asked. Her smirk deepened, and she laughed.

"Oh, I wish I knew," she said dreamily. She stood up straight, spinning on toes. "I just woke up in hear… I was perfect again. I _am_ perfect again!" she shrieked. She stopped her giddy dancing, and looked at Harry over her shoulder. "Would you like to dance, Master Potter?" she asked.

Harry dove to the side, avoiding a killing curse. It struck the wall, burrowing into it and sending dust everywhere. He stood, blowing a lock of hair out of his vision.

"Sure."

Ducking under another curse, Harry responded by forming a loose shield around himself, using the debris left over by the curses' impact on the walls. With a minimal defense up, he began to return fire.

A barrage of cutting curses and bludgeoning spells were hurled at Bellatrix, who blocked and dodged each one with inhuman speed and dexterity. She laughed, and with a flick of her wand, the floor beneath Harry shook violently, sending him to his knees.

The woman was toying with him.

"Isn't this fun, Potter?" she shrieked with unholy glee. A jet of pitch-black light shot from her wand, and quickly formed into a flurry of blades. Harry ducked under some of them, while others dissolved as they hit his make-shift shield. A few, however, made it through.

Pain, burning pain wracked his young body as the blades tore at his sides. Luckily, none made truly fatal strikes. However, the force and power of the magic sent him reeling. He was on the floor now, coughing up blood. This power… this couldn't have been the same woman. Harry had been hit by many a curse in the past… and none of them amounted to the power this woman was using.

_Aren't you glad you have that eye of yours? I'm sure it will come in handy. _

Harry closed his left eye. He had only seconds.

He could see Bellatrix distinctly… not just her aura. It looked as if she _was_ her aura. He saw her move her wand, as if in slow motion. His adrenaline was pumping into his blood, which itself was running through his veins like horses at a race track. He instantly understood.

Normally, a wand was used to conduct one's magical aura into some sort of pattern; Hence the wand movements. This pattern was what molded the spell, which was cast when the wand movements were used in conjunction with an incantation. However, as the pattern is made from the aura, it is crude. It was like trying to write something using your bare hands and a pile of sand. It bled out, loosing its distinct shape.

However, Bellatrix had pulled her aura _within_ herself. Now, the magic was being deposited into the pattern from her wand, like an ink out of a pen. The patterns were cleaner, sharper, and much more coherent. Thus, the spells were more potent. But that wasn't all; Harry recalled her speed. The magic, being forced within her body, was enhancing her physical prowess to superhuman levels.

Harry opened his left eye, and the world returned to normal. He flew back into the wall as he was hit by the most powerful hurling curse in this century. Shakily, he pulled himself out of the wall. Blood ran down from his nostrils, and he was sure he had broken at least three ribs. His breathing was ragged, and he could barely lift his wand.

Bellatrix smiled, and in a flash she was in front of him. Obviously, her speed was being aided by her intake of her aura. She leaned forward, and Harry felt her breath on his face.

She licked up blood dribbling down his lips.

"I like to play, Harry," she whispered. "But I know when my toys need a rest. We can play later!"

Harry's already abused body took another hit as he was throwing through the double doors he had entered through. He flew the air, hit the ground, bounced, hit the ground again, and skidded, before finally stopping when he hit a wall. He looked up, feeling dizzy, and breathing heavily. He was back in the ballroom… but the dancers took no notice of him. He was clear on the other side of the room, having flown over them already. He reasoned that they would not attack as long as he did not disrupt the 'festivities.'

It was a good thing he didn't plan to.

Harry swirled blood and saliva in his mouth, and licked his lips. He spit at the floor.

"Lestrange…" he whispered, his eyes shadowed by his fringe. He gritted his teeth, which were stained with blood. A sudden jolt of light came from his red and green irises. "_I'll kill you._"

_**0o0o0o0o0o0**_

Karen, despite living in a well-to-do neighborhood, was actually what would be defined as a slob. Sure, she cleaned up regularly, but in-between her clean-ups her home was messy enough to give Petunia Dursley a conniption.

Those were her exact thoughts as she waded through the various dirty clothes that littered the floor just outside her laundry room, dressed in little more than a bra and cut-off jean shorts. It had been a long first quarter at the elementary school, most likely due to the fact that it was, frankly, boring. Ever since Harry graduated Primary school, there was nobody left except for the carbon copy children of the neighborhood. It was the same thing, day-in and day-out. _Perfect_ _little angels_ (note the sarcasm) coming to school, doing their work (most of the time, anyway), and then running off into their own little cliques and such. There wasn't a single odd-egg in the bunch. The school had become conformist central.

"Ugh…" groaned the woman, dropping onto her couch and grabbing some gods-know-how-old soda can, swirling the contents. "Why'd I come here again?" She didn't remember. Grasping the remote from the coffee table, she flipped on the news. It had just started, and it seemed to be doing some story on missing persons. Karen started drinking the soda… it was warm, but not bad.

"_Several weeks ago, a young man went missing and never showed up at school_," droned the news man. "_Apparently he was supposed to catch a train on September First and never showed up. If you have any information on him, please alert your local police department. Here is a picture._"

Harry James Potter's face lit up the TV screen.

Karen choked on her soda, spitting the carbonated liquid all over her living room carpet and dribbling some on her chest.

"Fucker!"

AN: Aye, thar it be. And there was some fan-service to, for the guys if they were impatient with my lack of updating. As for the girls… umm…

Wasn't Bella's outfit pretty? (Nervous smiles, 'since I can't do a nervous smily worth shit because doesn't process all characters)

**(1)**: Sorry, no gothic shotacon for you aside from what just happened. Lol, British/Irish formal titles.


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